The Marauders - Year One
by MaraudersMichiefManaged
Summary: James Potter, Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew and Remus Lupin have all received their letters to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and are now entering their first year.
1. Time To Leave

The sun rose slowly over the mountain horizon outside James Potter's bedroom. The trees were just starting to turn the golden brown colours of autumn as the weather started to get colder and the sun dipped a little lower in the sky. August was officially over, as was summer, and the date of September 1st could only mean one thing. Today James was starting at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. For as long as he could remember, James had been waiting for this day, and ever since he got his acceptance letter a few months ago, he has been imagining himself a great wizard, like his dad and watching his mother intently as she used various spells to clean up the house. He knew that those spells would come in handy whilst he was away. He hated Muggle cleaning but knew that he's not allowed to use magic outside of school until he turns of age at seventeen which was a whole six years away, so he had to get used to it. Not anymore.

James Potter jumped out of bed excitedly, ruffled his always-messy black hair, and rammed his round glasses onto his face. He threw on the Muggle clothes that he had left out the day before and charged down the stairs into his living room where his father, Charles Potter, was reading the days Daily Prophet and his mother, Maria Potter, was cooking breakfast in the kitchen. How they were able to act so normal was completely beyond James. Struggling to keep still with excitement, James proceeded to pace up and down the room, while his parents laughed at him. He kept thinking about the school, soon to be his school, whilst thinking of all the stories that his parents had told him of their times there, the four houses, the Quidditch matches, the teachers, the classes, the spells…

James took out his wand, an 11-inch, and pliable mahogany one with a dragon heartstring core and just stared at it. It was hard to believe that it was really his, finally. Ever since he was old enough to understand what it was, James had longed for a wand of his own, and he was finally going to learn how to use it. Arriving at Hogwarts could not come soon enough.

After wolfing down his breakfast as fast as he possibly could, and somehow managing not to choke, James sat at stared at his parents with wide, excited eyes, willing them to eat faster, willing time to go faster, so he could finally set off. He couldn't remember ever being this excited, and bounced up and down on his seat, counting the seconds in his head.

'Trunk packed?' asked Charles.

'Yes.' replied James.

'Got all your books?'

'Yes.'

'Got all of your quills and ink?'

'Yes.'

'Ready to go?'

James couldn't help but grin.

'You bet I am, dad!'

'SIRIUS!'

The room practically shook with the volume of Walburga Black's shrieks and a tall, muscular looking boy by the name of Sirius Black opened his grey eyes. It wasn't the first time that he woke up due to the large number of decibels emitting from his mother's vocal chords. Slightly frustrated, he sleepily pulled himself out of his bed and looked over at his calendar.

'September 1st,' he whispered, eyes widening and grin appearing. 'SEPTEMBER 1st!'

Sirius suddenly felt more awake than he could ever remember being. He practically skipped around the room as he got changed and threw various objects that were lying about into a large, open trunk. For so long he had been waiting for this day. The day that he could finally leave this horrible house that he is obligated to call home.

Sauntering down the stairs, trying to conceal his excitement, Sirius came face to face the terrifying form of his mother.

'Table. Now.' she instructed.

Slightly nervous, Sirius walked into the kitchen to find his father, Orion Black, sitting at the head of the table, clearly waiting for him. Walburga entered also, slamming the door behind her as she went.

'Now, Sirius. I just wanted to make you clear on a couple of things before you leave this house.' Orion said, glaring at his son.

'First of all, you are a Black. You must behave in the appropriate way. I will not stand for any detention or rule breaking. We are a respected family, we have been for generations and I will not have you ruining the reputation of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black, am I clear?'

'Yes, father.' Sirius replied, struggling to hide his aggravation at his family name.

'Second,' his mother joined in, 'I will not have you befriending any Mudblood or blood-traitor scum. You are a pureblood, the way wizards should be, and I will not have any son of mine mingling with filth like that. Am I clear?'

Through gritted teeth Sirius gave a, 'Yes, mother.' He hated the way his parents acted. All through his life he had disagreed with their views on blood purity and Muggles but had learned, after several beatings, to keep his mouth shut and answer the way his entire family wanted him too, despite how much he had grown to hate them all.

'Is that everything, then? Can I go now?' he asked.

'Are you packed?' his father shot at him.

'Yes.'

'Have you got all your books?'

'Yes.'

'Have you got the Slytherin scarf I gave you?'

'…Yes.'

Walburga's hand whipped backwards and slapped Sirius across the face.

'Do NOT lie to your father!' she screeched.

Sirius held his face, tears stinging in his eyes, though he refused to let them fall. His father pulled a green and silver scarf out from underneath the table.

'How can you when I have it here?' he smirked.

His father threw it at him as hard as he could, which wasn't very hard, considering the material that it was made out of, but still Sirius cowered away from the looming man standing over him.

'You WILL be in Slytherin, Sirius.' he stated, before he and his wife swept from the room.

Sirius looked at the scarf on the ground, hating it. His whole family had been in Slytherin and he hated the lot of them. There was nothing he wanted more than to be away from them, different from them.

'I'll kill myself if I'm in Slytherin,' Sirius whispered, still holding his face, which was starting to bruise, and he left the room, dreaming of all the time he would soon have away from this house.

Peter Pettigrew landed on his bedroom floor with a loud THUMP! Dazed, he woke up and realized that he had rolled out of his bed during his dream. It was a good dream, pity he couldn't remember it. Heaving himself off the floor and running a hand through his short mousy brown hair, Peter looked around his room. There were clothes scattered all over the floor in the general area of his trunk. Suddenly remembering what day it was, Peter looked at his watch to find that he had slept in longer than he meant to. He was going to get up early on account of the fact that he hadn't finished packing and now there was barely time. Running around the room, grabbing everything he could get his hands on; he threw them into the large trunk messily. He had never been very organised.

'MUM! Mum, can you come here?!' he yelled, whilst hurling an old book across the room.

Soon enough, Neva Pettigrew arrived and stood at the door, taking in the bombsight that was once her son's bedroom.

'Mum, I can't find my Transfiguration book! Or my cauldron! And … and WHERE'S MY WAND?!' he cried, his small, watery eyes darting around the room.

Neva sighed at her son's carelessness. How he was going to manage when he left was beyond her.

'Honestly, Peter, you'd lose your head if it wasn't attached to your neck.'

'Mum, can't you just help me?'

'Your book is lying on the couch where you left it when you were reading over it yesterday. I packed your cauldron for you last night after you went to sleep because I had a feeling that you would forget it and your father put your wand on the kitchen table when he went to work this morning.'

Peter's father, Wilfred Pettigrew, worked at the Ministry of Magic as an Unspeakable in the Department of Mysteries. His father worked long hours and Peter didn't see him very much, and knew almost nothing about his work. Wilfred took his job very seriously and spent more time and effort there than he did with his own family, subsequently Peter generally concluded that he had been raised completely by his mother. Sometimes he found himself thinking that his father was ashamed of him and that was why he was never home. It was because of this that Peter wanted to go to Hogwarts so much, to show his father that he could be proud to have a son like Peter.

'Oh, thanks mum.'

'Is that everything then?'

'I think so.' Peter said, scanning the room for any stray items that he had forgotten.

Neva pulled her son into a tight hug, which he returned. Peter felt quite guilty about leaving, because he knew that his mother would be alone in the house most of the time while his father was always at work. Neva felt tears sting her eyes and she willed them away. She was so proud of Peter, going to Hogwarts at long last. She was going to miss him so much, and she was nervous that he would have trouble making friends, because he was quite shy.

'I'm really going to do this, mum.' Peter smiled.

'I know, baby. You're going to have a great time.'

A pale, thin boy by the name of Remus Lupin sat in the middle of his room, staring at his ceiling. A few years ago his mother had bought him glow in the dark star stickers to decorate his room and his dad had levitated them to stick to the ceiling. The small boy used to sit and stare at them for hours, thinking that it would be the only kind of magic he would ever get to experience. Whilst his mother, Audra Lupin, is a Muggle, his father, John Lupin, is an Auror at the Ministry of Magic so Remus knew all about Hogwarts and heard all sorts of stories from his dad about the school but until that fateful day when he got his letter, Remus had never believed that he would ever get accepted there because of his secret.

'Remus, are you packed?' asked Audra, watching her son from his bedroom door and knowing exactly what he was thinking about.

'Yes, mum.' Remus answered quietly, almost a whisper.

'It'll be ok, son. Professor Dumbledore said that he had everything ready for you when you went.'

Remus nodded, feeling tears in his eyes. He hated getting any form of special treatment. It just reminded him even more of the monster that he was. In truth, he was scared about going to Hogwarts. He was absolutely terrified. It would be the first time that he would be away from his family for a significant amount of time, and he would be under the responsibility of a load of teachers, all of who would know about him. He hated people knowing his secret, knowing what he really is, and knowing he's a monster.

'Remus, you know that you can't tell anyone. It has to be a secret,' Audra whispered.

'I know mum. I'm scared. What if someone notices that I disappear every full moon? What if they figure it out? I don't want them to know that I'm a monster.' At the last word Remus hung his head, and a single tear ran down his cheek.

'Remus John Lupin, you listen to me right now. You are not a monster, and don't you ever let anyone tell you that you are!' Audra scolded, then allowed her tone to soften and went forward to put a hand on her son's shoulder. 'I know it will be hard. This was never going to be easy, you knew that. Just see how it goes, ok. You'll make lots of friends and have a great time, just like any normal kid your age. I'll go make breakfast; you just come down when you're ready, ok?'

Her son nodded and she left the room. Remus stood up, and pulled at his shabby clothes. His dad earned enough for them to get by but they didn't have very much money to spend on new clothes. Remus's mother had to give up work to take care of him when he was first born and intended to go back when Remus was older, but it would be later realised that that wasn't a possibility. Remus couldn't be left alone to look after himself on the full moons, Audra knew that and Remus knew that, but he still felt guilty about it.

A pale blue jumper lay folded on top of Remus's trunk and he pulled it on over his T-Shirt. Even though the summer had ended, there was still some lingering heat and he didn't want to have to wear the jumper but it covered his arms and the many scars that covered them and his whole body.

'You stupid idiot, Remus,' he whispered to himself, 'Look what you've done to yourself. You stupid monster!'

He looked in the mirror at his pale complexion and the dark circles outlining his eyes and sighed before leaving his room to find his mother again. He was going to leave soon, live somewhere else. He wondered how the wolf would deal with the different surroundings, prayed that his transformations would somehow be better, all the while longing that he could be like every other magical child his age, merely excited about going to Hogwarts, not having to worry about what was going to happen to them when they got there. Not having to be a werewolf.


	2. Platform Nine and Three Quarters

CHAPTER 2: Platform 9¾

'Together?' Charles asked, looking down at James.

'Yeah,' James replied, grinning.

As one, father and son ran at the brick wall between Platforms 9 and 10 in King's Cross Station, London, emerging on the other side. James looked around him, taking in the sight of Platform 9¾ and the scarlet train, the Hogwarts Express. The platform was full of teenage witches and wizards saying goodbye and hugging their parents, some dressed in their house colours already. The young black haired boy looked around in wonder at the red and gold, blue and bronze, yellow and black and green and silver clad students.

'So there are four houses, dad?' he asked, barely managing to tear his eyes away from the sight before him to look at his father.

'Yes. Can you remember what they are called?' Charles asked.

'Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff and Slytherin, right?'

'That's right.'

James smiled. Everything was becoming so real to him now. Soon he would be part of this rabble of students, meeting up with his new friends from his house.

'I hope I'm in Gryffindor,' he breathed, not even realised that he had spoken aloud until he heard his dad chuckle beside him.

'Every house has its own merits, son,' Charles smiled, winking at his son.

'Yes, but you were a Gryffindor so they're obviously the best,' James shrugged, turning to grin at his father who winked at him in return. 'Don't let your mother hear you say that, son. The Ravenclaw in her might not like it.'

James grinned.

'So, are you sure you have everything, James?' Maria asked, nervously smoothing out his T-Shirt and trying in vain to flatten his messy hair.

'Mum, seriously stop fussing. I'll be fine.'

'Oh, I know you will Jamesy,' she said, and kissed her son on the cheek.

'Mum!' James protested, trying to squirm out of his mother's clutches.

Maria and Charles just laughed and, after one last hug, waved to their son as he boarded the Hogwarts Express.

'Here I go,' James whispered to himself, smiling.

Sirius Black ran through the magical barrier between Platforms 9 and 10 at full speed, not even flinching as he went straight through the wall onto Platform 9¾. His eyes darted around at all of the people cluttering up the platform and sped up his walking to try and get away from his parents.

Orion's large, commanding hand grasped Sirius's shoulder before he could get lost in the swarm of witches and wizards. Sirius shrank down, not wanting to admit that he was scared, and walked at a slower pace with his father by his side. The boy's left eye was bruised from when his mother had hit him. He was sure that she could have healed it in a second, but she refused. Walburga was a short way behind them with Sirius's younger brother Regulus.

'Uncle Orion!' came a voice that Sirius did not want to hear.

'Bella!' came Orion's reply as he turned to see Bellatrix Black holding hands with her boyfriend Rodolphus Lestrange, a perfectly acceptable pureblood Slytherin, like herself.

'Sirius,' Bellatrix acknowledged curtly, avoiding his gaze.

'Bellatrix,' Sirius returned, with just as much contempt in his voice. He couldn't stand his older cousin. As deranged as the rest of them, obsessed with blood purity and a Slytherin through and through. To summarize, she was all of the things that Sirius hated.

'How are Narcissa and Andromeda?' Walburga asked.

'Oh, they are fine. Cissy is graduating this year, and there are talks of her getting engaged afterwards!' Bellatrix replied, a glimmer of excitement in her eyes. Sirius was surprised that she could even feel excitement. He was sure that that counted as a positive emotion and he was pretty sure she didn't have any.

'Engaged? To whom?' Orion enquired.

'Lucius Malfoy,' Bellatrix said.

'Ah, a Malfoy! Good choice. Good family. He's a Slytherin, isn't he? Pureblood?'

'Of course, Uncle Orion! What sort of addition to the family would he be if he wasn't?' Bellatrix laughed, glaring at Sirius with taunting eyes as she did so.

Sirius closed his eyes and began to breathe heavily to try and stop his hands from shaking with anger.

'I'd better go and get on the train now, father,' Sirius spoke up.

Orion turned and looked at his son. He noticed the resentment in Sirius's eyes at the very mention of the Slytherin house and began to grow angry.

'Fine. Just go,' he hissed.

Sirius, slightly taken aback by the fury in his father's eyes, said a quick goodbye to his mother and brother who merely nodded at him, and he walked away, onto the train and away from his family. At last.

Peter stared at the wall in front of him.

'I…I run at it?' he asked, his voice quivering slightly.

'Yes. It doesn't hurt. It'll just be a bit strange and scary the first time because you've never done it before. Look, we'll do it together,' Neva Pettigrew comforted, placing a hand on her son's shoulder and pushing him forward into a run together.

Peter scrunched up his eyes and winced as he went straight through a solid brick wall. It was a very strange sensation and he wasn't entirely sure that he liked it. Upon opening his eyes, he saw more people than he had ever seen in one place all at once. An explosion of colour, swarming around the massive Hogwarts Express. Peter tightened his grip on his trolley and pushed forward through the rabble, his mother at his side.

'Are you ok, Petey?' Neva asked, seeing the white knuckles on the metal.

'Yeah, I'm fine, it's just…'

'It's just what?'

'What if I'm rubbish?' Peter whispered.

For a while, Peter's father had been sure that his son was a Squib. He just seemed too…normal. It wasn't until he was eight and Peter made the neighbour's cat swell up to three times its normal size that Wilfred realised that Peter was magical. Since then it wasn't that he had a lack of magical ability, it was just that he couldn't seem to do anything with it. He had plenty of magic, and he wasn't stupid, he just didn't seem able to get it to do what he wanted.

Neva sighed at looked at her son. He was short and a little on the chubby side but despite how he may appear, she knew that he would be able to do some tremendous magic in time.

'Now you listen to me, Peter Pettigrew, you can do anything you put your mind to. Just keep trying and you know you'll get there.'

Peter gave his mother a sad little smile and began to head towards the train. He turned and gave his mother a hug.

'I'll try and make you proud. You and dad,' he promised.

'We will be proud of you no matter what, Petey. Just promise me you'll have fun and make friends.'

'I promise. Goodbye mum.'

'Goodbye Peter. I love you. Don't forget to write!'

'I won't. I love you too.' Peter replied as he turned his back on his mother and clambered onto the train that would take him away to the place where he would learn how to make his parents proud.

'Are you ok, Remus?' Audra asked, looking at him with concern in her eyes. Around all of the other students he looked so much paler and ill than she realised and she suddenly felt a jolt of fear at leaving him.

'I'm ok, mum. I'm just a bit…It's a bit of a change,' the young werewolf replied. He looked around him and saw all of the other students with huge trolleys to carry their trunks and various other bags whilst he just pulled his single, small trunk along by its handle. He hadn't ever resented his parents for the fact that they were poor but he had to admit to himself that he was scared of what other people would think.

'Remus, you're going to stretch that jumper if you keep pulling at it,' Neva sighed.

Remus hadn't even been aware of the fact that he was nervously pulling his jumper down over his hands and twisting at it. With a quiet apology to his mother, he stopped and stared at the ground thinking about the full moon in two weeks time. It would be his first ever away from home and he didn't know how he felt about that. He was glad that his mother didn't have to be there. She was a Muggle and unable to heal him after his transformation was over. The wolf didn't like being kept hidden without any food and in turn would attack itself instead, earning him all of the scars and cuts that littered his body. He knew that it couldn't be easy for a mother to see their child like that and not be able to do anything to help, so in that way he was glad that she wouldn't be there this time. Yet he was more scared for this one than he ever had been before. It would be the first time that he wouldn't wake up to his mother's face to comfort him before the Healers' arrived to fix him up. The thing that scared him most was not knowing what was going to happen. Professor Dumbledore had sent him a letter at the same time as his Hogwarts acceptance letter arrived to tell him that they were aware of his lycanthropy and they had made suitable arrangements for him that would be discussed upon his arrival to the school. Remus was very nervous and scared, but he had to admit that he was excited. His father's magic had always fascinated Remus and when he realised that he was magical himself, he had yearned to learn how to control it properly. Some nights when he wasn't at work, Remus's dad would tell him stories of Hogwarts and the four houses and the teachers until he fell asleep. A lot of the time Remus considered Hogwarts as some kind of fantasy land, like some of the Muggle bedtime stories his mother would tell him but now here he was, about to board a train to take him away to his fantasy. He couldn't help but smile.

'There you go. It'll be ok, Remus. Now, on you go before you miss the train,' Audra smiled, tears beginning to form in her eyes.

'Goodbye, mum. I love you,' Remus said, hugging his mother as tightly as he could before turning his back on her and boarding the train.

As the Hogwarts Express set off, he found himself an empty compartment and continued to wave at his now freely crying mother until the train turned a corner and she vanished from sight.

'There's no going back now, Remus. There's no going back now,' he whispered to himself as he dreamt about the new life that the train was speeding him too, unaware that somewhere on the train, three others were saying the exact same thing.


	3. My House

**A/N: Disclaimer, there is a bit of JK Rowling's work in here to tie it it with the books. I wish I could say that I wrote it but unfortunately her genius mind is far superior to mine.**

**Anyway, ENJOY!**

* * *

CHAPTER 3: My House

As the train turned the corner and his mother disappeared from sight, Remus sighed and leant back in his seat in the empty compartment. It was real now. He was going to Hogwarts. Remus smiled and rolled over, pressing his face against the cold window and closing his eyes, hoping to get some sleep.

James Potter walked along the corridor of the Hogwarts Express, looking around in search of a vacant compartment, not wanting to admit to himself that he was beginning to feel quite nervous on his own. Excited, but nervous.

'Hey, is that compartment over there empty?' came a voice behind James. He turned to see a muscular looking boy, an inch or two taller than himself walking behind him, also peering around looking for a place to sit down. His head was slightly lowered and facing the ground and his long hair fell over to hide his face.

James gazed in the direction that the boy had nodded to see a compartment with only one inhabitant.

'There's only one person in it. I think he's sleeping,' came James's reply.

Without another word the tall boy started forward and opened the door, putting his belongings in the overhead compartment and reaching down to help James with his. Together they sat down opposite each other with James beside the sleeping figure and the other boy lounged across the seat opposite. James noticed a nasty looking bruise on the boy's left eye, but decided to not mention it.

'I'm James,' he said, offering his hand to the stranger.

'Sirius,' the tall boy replied, shaking hands with James.

'Any idea who this is?' asked James, pointing to the sleeping form next to him with his thumb.

'None at all. He looks quite ill. Maybe we should leave him to sleep,' Sirius suggested, craning his next to try and get a look at the sleeping boy's face. He was incredibly pale, with dark circles under his eyes and was very thin and small. His light brown hair was long, yet shorter than Sirius's and neater than James's, but looked unkempt somehow, and his clothes were shabby and seemed to be hanging off him in their bagginess although whether that was because they were simply too big or because he was so thin, it was hard to tell.

Suddenly a loud crashing sound came from the corridor and a short, slightly chubby boy pulled open the door looking panic stricken.

'Can I sit here?' he asked, his small watery eyes looking around taking in the sight of the three boys. Deciding that they weren't going to hurt him, he relaxed a little.

'Sure. Here, let me help you with your stuff,' Sirius said, standing up to help the newcomer heave his bags into the overhead compartment with a loud thud.

The noise startled Remus into awakening. He groaned quietly and stole a glance behind him to see that three boys, all of whom seemed to be his age, had joined him. With a sigh, he turned away from them and looked out the window at the trees going by. He was always afraid to make friends because he knew that as soon as they found about that he was a monster they would leave him. The very thought scared him.

'I'm Sirius, by the way, and this is James,' said Sirius, gesturing to himself and the other boy as he spoke.

'Peter,' introduced the new boy, sitting down next to Sirius. 'Who's that?' he added in a whisper, pointing to the frame of the smallest boy who appeared to still be sleeping.

'Don't know. He was sleeping when we arrived, we thought it best to leave him to it,' James explained.

Remus smiled. At least the boys were considerate.

'Well, I'm awake now,' he stated, turning around to face the others in the compartment. 'My name is Remus.'

'Welcome to the land of the living, Remus.' Sirius cheered, grinning at the small boy. He was about to offer his hand but decided against it, thinking that he would only end up snapping the boy's bony fingers by accident.

The boys all talked as if they had known each other for years when a girl with long, dark red hair entered, followed in quick succession by a lanky boy with greasy, shoulder length hair. The boys looked up briefly at the newcomers, who were now talking, in fact seemed to be arguing, before shrugging and continuing their conversation.

'But this is it!' said the greasy haired boy, with obvious excitement in his voice. 'This is it! We're off to Hogwarts!'

The red haired girl merely nodded but smiled in spite of herself.

'You'd better be in Slytherin,' the boy continued.

At the mention of the house, Sirius's head flipped round to look at the pair whilst James turned as well.

'Slytherin?' James repeated. 'Who wants to be in Slytherin? I think I'd leave, wouldn't you?' he continued, directing the last question to Sirius who was unsmiling.

'My whole family have been in Slytherin,' he said resentfully.

'Blimey,' said James, 'and I thought you seemed all right!'

Sirius grinned at his new friend.

'Maybe I'll break the tradition. Where are you heading, if you've got the choice?'

James grinned back and drew an invisible sword and begun to brandish it around.

'Gryffindor, where dwell the brave at heart! Like my dad.'

The Slytherin boy snorted. James spun around and pointed his invisible sword at him.

'Got a problem with that?' he challenged.

'No,' said the boy, slightly sneering, 'if you'd rather be brawny than brainy-'

'Where're you hoping to go seeing as you're neither?' Sirius interrupted causing James to roar with laughter.

'Come on, Severus, let's find another compartment,' the redhead girl said, throwing James and Sirius a glare of dislike.

James and Sirius continued to laugh, and James made to trip up Severus as he left calling 'See ya Snivellus!' as the boy was practically dragged out by the girl. A slightly awkward silence reigned after they left which James broke.

'Which house do you think you'll be in then Peter? Remus?'

'Hufflepuff,' Peter said, hanging his head, earning a snicker from Sirius.

'I don't know. I've not really given it much thought. Maybe Ravenclaw,' Remus said, looking at James.

'So, Slytherin, huh, Sirius?' James teased, winking.

'Shut up, Mr Invisible Sword,' Sirius retaliated.

'That sounds like a challenge!' James cried, mocking shock.

'EN GARDE!' Sirius called, lunging at James with his own invisible sword.

The play fight continued over the whole train journey with all four boys eventually joining in. Sirius couldn't get the grin off his face but he couldn't get the thought of Slytherin house out of his head. Looking at James, he found himself praying even more so that he wouldn't get put in the house. If James was going to end up in Gryffindor, he would never be able to stay friends with him from Slytherin, and he honestly felt that he had found a great friend in James. Remus looked up at the other three boys, with a half smile. He was happy and he was actually having fun. 'Is this what it is like to have friends?' he thought. Still he couldn't help but keep a cautious distance. Remus knew that he couldn't get to close to his new friends. If he did it would only hurt more if they ever found out about his secret. No one in their right minds would want to be friends with someone like him if they knew. Peter brandished his sword along with the others, hardly believing that he was part of it. He had always found it difficult to make friends. A part of him was worried about being put in Hufflepuff. He had nothing against Hufflepuff and was frankly so happy that he was going to Hogwarts he would go into it gladly if that was where he was meant to be, but he had managed to make friends and he was having fun and he didn't want to be separated from them. James grinned manically at the chaos he had started as four boys traipsed across the compartment, Peter jumping on the seats, himself standing on the table, Sirius hanging off the overhead compartment and Remus standing on the ground, looking cautious but still joining in. Inside, James was praying that he was in Gryffindor, he had never wanted anything more but as he looked around at his friends he recalled them in their house predictions. James, a Gryffindor. Remus, a Ravenclaw. Peter, a Hufflepuff. Sirius, a Slytherin. Even though his father's old prejudice had been passed down to him and he despised Slytherin to his very core, if he was with Sirius maybe it wouldn't be such a bad house to be in. He couldn't see himself in any house but Gryffindor, he didn't want to be in any house but Gryffindor, however he thought to himself that as long as he got to stay with his friends he didn't care as much.


	4. An Unexpected Result

CHAPTER 4: An Unexpected Result

There were a lot of first years. Sirius would take a guess at around 300. They were all gathered around the massive doors that acted as the entrance to the Great Hall. The decibel level just kept on rising as another person introduced themselves and a conversation began. The four friends stood at the back of the group after being detained…

'I can't believe you flipped the boat, Sirius,' Remus sighed, wringing out the robes that he had gotten changed into. His hair was soaking with his fringe covering his eyes, causing him to flip it out of the way. Before the train journey had drawn to a close, they had all got changed which Remus was secretly happy about. Due to their lack of money, Remus was going to get hand-me-down robes from his cousin Anthony, but for once his height worked to his advantage and upon realising that they were far too big, his mother had bought him new ones. It was one of the only outfits that was truly his, that hadn't been passed down and he was secretly overjoyed even though they were absolutely soaked now.

Peter and James laughed and began to wring their own robes out whilst Sirius shook his hair to get the water out of it.

'Sirius, you're like a dog,' James laughed.

'A dog? That sounds like a challenge!' Sirius said, once again drawing his invisible sword.

Peter laughed while Remus sighed as James and Sirius began to duel once again. A crowd was beginning to form around the pair until Professor Minerva McGonagall stood outside the Great Hall doors and somehow managed to gain everyone's attention in the blink of an eye.

'Welcome to Hogwarts,' she began. 'The start of term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your house will be something like your family within Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your house, sleep in your house dormitory and spend free time in your house common room. The four houses are called Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin. Each house has its own noble history and each has produced outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn your house points, while any rule breaking will lose house points. At the end of the year, the house with the most points is awarded the House Cup, a great honour. I hope each of you will be a credit to whichever house becomes yours. The ceremony will take place in a few minutes in front of the rest of the school so I suggest you smarten yourselves up as much as you can whilst you are waiting.'

Her eyes swept the room and lingered on the soaking wet James, Sirius, Peter and Remus. With a slightly raised brow she turned from them and entered the Great Hall.

James stood in the large group huddled before the rest of the school in front of the teacher's table, facing the Sorting Hat. Each student was called in alphabetical order and sorted into their respective houses and it was only then that James realised that he didn't know any of his friends' surnames. Just as he was about to ask, Professor McGonagall called out 'Black, Sirius!' and, taking a deep, calming breath, Sirius stepped forward, sat on the stool and felt the hat being placed on his head.

'A Black, eh?' came a small voice from inside Sirius's head. He gave a small jump of surprise and the voice continued. 'You come from a long line of Slytherins, don't you? But strange, I see that you aren't like them. You aren't like them at all. Still, I sense that you are expected to go to Slytherin.'

'Don't you dare put me in Slytherin,' Sirius said. 'I'm not like them. I'll kill myself if I go into Slytherin.'

'Well, we can't have that now, can we? Okay, GRYFFINDOR!'

Sirius was practically stuck to the seat in his surprise. He couldn't remember the last time he was this happy. Stealing a glance at the Slytherin table he saw Bellatrix stare at him incredulously with utter hate in her eyes as he joined his new housemates at the Gryffindor table. Already, he felt like he was home at last.

James cheered as Sirius took his seat at the Gryffindor table. Even though he had only known him for a few hours, James felt like he had known Sirius forever and he was glad that he wasn't a Slytherin, because he didn't belong there.

'Evans, Lily!'

James looked up to see the red haired girl from the train approach the hat. He hadn't noticed before but she was really very pretty, and had beautiful emerald eyes…He prayed that she wasn't a Slytherin as that Severus boy had said.

'GRYFFINDOR!'

Smirking, James looked around him until he finally found the face of the greasy haired boy, clapping along with the rest but looking almost distraught. Deep in his thoughts he barely noticed that 'Lupin, Remus' was called out until the small boy began to move forward.

Remus grew even paler as he approached the stool and the hat was placed on his head. What if it didn't think that he deserved to learn magic because of what he was? What if he just sat there for hours until the teachers concluded that there must be a mistake and he was sent back home?

'Ah, a werewolf.'

Remus flinched at the word and his eyes began to dart around the room, fearfully.

'Don't worry they can't hear me. I've never sorted one of your kind before. Where to put you? A good mind, yes indeed. Talent, undoubtedly. Loyalty, yes, but a fear of letting people in? There seems to be a lack of ambition. Do you doubt your place in the magical world?'

'You know what I am. Doesn't that answer your question?' Remus whispered, feeling his eyes stinging with tears.

'You will do well in this school, I can see that. I guess there is only one option – GRYFFINDOR!'

Sirius stood up and cheered whilst pushing people along the bench so that Remus could come and sit next to him. Remus was bewildered but incredibly happy and he found himself grinning as he took his seat.

'Pettigrew, Peter!'

'Hm, yes, I see. Much magical ability and potential, a lack of self-belief. A lack of ambition – not Slytherin, simply not suited to Ravenclaw...Perhaps Hufflepuff? But what is this? You appear to have made friends that have already been sorted somewhere else. How can I separate you when you are happily in a group already? Yes, I can see you doing well in GRYFFINDOR!'

Peter's jaw dropped and he wasn't sure whether or not to really believe it, but sure enough, Sirius was shouting at a couple of other first years in front of him to move up so Peter could sit opposite. He took his seat and smiled at Sirius and Remus before turning to look at James whose name had just been called. The Sorting Hat was placed on his head.

'A Potter! I know just what to do with you – GRYFFINDOR!'

James grinned and charged down to the table to join his friends, hardly able to believe that the four of them had really all ended up in the same house together. And just like that, their life at Hogwarts began.


	5. First Class

**CHAPTER 5: First Class**

James opened his eyes in the morning to the sight of the drapes of his four-poster bed in the Gryffindor dormitory that he shared with Sirius, Peter and Remus. He grinned as he stretched and sat up. His first proper day at Hogwarts. Today he would be attending classes and learning all about magic and he couldn't wait.

The room was arranged with two beds on each side of the room. James's bed was on the right hand side next to the door with Sirius next to him by the window. Peter was opposite Sirius, also next to the window with Remus next to him nearest the bathroom. Each of them had their curtains pulled over; concealing them from sight but from the soft breathing and silence in the room James knew that he was the only one awake. Smirking, he stood up as quietly as he could and tip toed around the room, opening all of the curtains of his friend's beds. Sirius looked so strange sleeping. Awake he looked so powerful but asleep he looked so harmless. Peter looked very wimpy asleep, curling up into a little ball and he kept twitching his nose. Remus looked frankly quite worrying asleep. With his pale complexion and thin hair falling about his face he looked almost fragile and James nearly had second thoughts about his plan, but nevertheless got back on his own bed, stood up and leaped onto Sirius's bed.

'WAKE UP SIRIUS! WAKE UP!' he yelled, jumping up and down. He proceeded to do the same to Peter and Remus in turn, though not as roughly to the latter and round and round until they had all woken up.

'Blimey, James, could you not have just set an alarm for us like any normal person?' Sirius yawned, pulling himself into an upright position and stretching.

'Yeah, did you have to wake us up like that?' Peter asked, rubbing his back from when he had leaped out of bed in fright and landed on the ground.

'It's not my fault you fell out of bed, Pete. And what would be the fun in an alarm? I'm surprised you even asked that, Sirius,' he responded.

Remus sat up in bed and looked at his friends. James was standing in the middle of the room, completely wide-awake and practically bouncing up and down in excitement for the day ahead. Sirius's hair was sticking up in all directions and Peter was sitting on the floor, looking tired and confused as if he was trying to figure out he had got there. It was still hard for Remus to believe that he was really here, in the Gryffindor dormitory, in Hogwarts School, with friends. He grinned and jumped out of bed to stand by James, all tiredness gone. Still, he wasn't going to let the black haired boy get away with waking him up in such a way. He winked at Sirius and tipped his head in the direction of James's bed and smiled. Sirius grinned back. Remus pushed James as hard as he could into the bed and Sirius wrapped him up in the curtains and sheets and they all stood back and watch the boy flail about in a vain attempt to untangle himself.

'Remus! Sirius! Get me out of here! Peter, help!'

Laughing, the three boys stepped forward and helped James escape from the labyrinth of material.

'Come on, guys, we're going to be late for breakfast if we don't get a move on,' James grinned, unperturbed by what had just happened.

Then James, Sirius and Peter all turned and began to get changed in the room. Remus bit his lip and looked around nervously. He opened his trunk, pulled out his robes and retreated to the bathroom to get changed in private. As the door closed the other three boys looked up at each other and shrugged, confused.

Inside the bathroom, Remus began to get changed, pulling his clothes on slowly wincing slightly as they went over his wounds from the last full moon. Werewolf wounds were cursed and could never heal up properly, the proof being in the countless scars all over the small boy's body. A werewolf bit Remus when he was merely four years old and seven years of turning into the beast once a month had taken its toll and left its fair share of injuries as the wolf attacked itself because of the lack of food. Each month, Remus would be locked up in his basement and chained to the floor so that when he transformed he couldn't get loose. Although he knew it was a necessity, Remus still didn't like it. He got changed in the bathroom in silence. If his roommates found out about his lycanthropy they wouldn't want to be friends with him anymore. They would be afraid of him and the monster he was and if they saw all of his scars there would be questions. Questions that he wouldn't know how to answer and he couldn't let that happen. It has to be secret. No one can know.

The four boys sat in the Great Hall eating breakfast. A loud rumbling noise was heard and several screeches as a huge flock of owls swooped into the hall to deliver mail. All four of the boys received letters, which they opened eagerly, except Sirius, who started at his with a look of deepest loathing. It was bright red and starting to smoke slightly.

'Is that a Howler?' James said incredulously. 'Blimey, Sirius, it's only the first day! What could you possibly have done to deserve a Howler already?'

'Oh, I've got a pretty good idea,' Sirius replied, glancing down at his Gryffindor tie.

'Aren't you going to open it?' asked Peter.

'Suppose I have to, don't I?'

Suddenly the screech of Walburga Black rung throughout the Great Hall, projected to twice its normal volume causing Peter to yelp and fall out of his chair in shock, James's mouth to hang open and Remus to quickly cover his ears. Sirius just sat and glared at the letter with as straight a face as he could muster despite the rage that was pulsing through his veins.

'SIRIUS ORION BLACK! HOW DARE YOU?! A GRYFFINDOR?! I THOUGHT YOUR FATHER WAS GOING TO DIE OF SHAME WHEN WE HEARD! YES, I CAN SEE YOU KNOW, FRATERNISING WITH HALF BLOODS AND MUDBLOODS AND EVERY OTHER KIND OF FILTH AND SCUM! YOU'VE DISGRACED THE NAME OF THE MOST NOBLE AND ANCIENT HOUSE OF BLACK! DOESN'T THAT NAME MEAN ANYTHING TO YOU?! I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN YOU WERE GOING TO BE NOTHING BUT A DISAPPOINTMENT! - '

Walburga Black continued in this way for almost five complete minutes until she finally finished with a loud scream and the Howler burst into flames and was gone.

A stunned silence echoed around the Great Hall, broken by the Slytherins jeering and laughing at Sirius, whose hands were now shaking in rage.

'I, um, I take it that was your mother,' James said, stunned.

'Unfortunately,' Sirius hissed through gritted teeth.

Remus reached forward and swept the ashes off the table and away from Sirius who just continued to stare at them with such anger in his eyes that Remus was waiting for the ashes to be set on fire all over again.

'Thanks, Remus,' Sirius whispered.

'It's okay. It can't be easy having a mother like that. Was it her that gave you the bruise on your eye?'

'Yeah, yeah it was. Charming woman,' Sirius said with as much contempt in his voice as he could possibly get. 'Not that it matters. I'm away from them all now.'

Immediately brightening up at this thought, Sirius grabbed the closest food to him, which was sausages, and began to throw them down, grinning. At this moment sheets of paper in the form of timetables began to fly around the room.

'Ok, so Transfiguration first,' Sirius read out, having gotten his timetable first as was the alphabetical order. The rest of the boys nodded.

'Any idea where the classroom is?' Remus asked.

'Not a clue,' James replied, receiving his own timetable.

'Should we leave now then, in case we get lost,' Peter suggested, ogling his own timetable as if it were written in a foreign language.

'Suppose we'd better. I wouldn't want to see McGonagall mad. Well, not on the first day, at least,' Sirius agreed, winking.

The four boys stood up and headed out of the Great Hall with their bags slung over their shoulders and set off, although they didn't know it, in the completely wrong direction.

The door of the Transfiguration classroom opened with a BANG and James, Sirius, Peter and Remus toppled through it onto the floor.

'Well, thank you for joining us gentlemen,' Professor McGonagall said, looking down on the four boys currently trapped in a tangle of limbs on the ground.

'Sorry, Professor, we got lost,' Remus replied, standing up and dusting himself off.

'Then perhaps a map?' the Professor suggested, glaring at the four boys. Her gaze softened and she sighed. 'Take a seat,' she instructed, pointing at four vacant seats in the back corner.

'Oh, Mr Lupin, Professor Dumbledore would like to see you in his office,' Professor McGonagall said, peering over at the boy who was already deep in conversation with the other three latecomers.

Remus looked up at her in confusion, a nervous feeling fluttering in his stomach. Sirius, James and Peter stared at him in amazement and confusion. He had done nothing wrong, why was he being summoned to the headmaster's office, of all places? After a shared worried glance from his friends, Remus stood up and walked to the front of the class. Professor McGonagall handed him a note with the password to Dumbledore's office and a hurriedly drawn map, and he left the classroom.

'Sugar Quill?' Remus said.

A large gargoyle leapt out of the way to reveal a spiral staircase that the small boy began to ascend. A large door was at the top of it, which Remus knocked nervously.

'Ah, Mr Lupin! Come in, come in,' Professor Dumbledore said, cheerful as ever. Remus entered the large room and looked around. It was amazing. All of the headmasters's magical possessions had their own place and looked magnificent. Remus felt various eyes watching him and turned to see portraits of all of the old headmasters of Hogwarts smiling down at him except one, who seemed to be glaring. This headmaster had the label 'Phineas Nigellus Black'. Remus wondered if he was any relation to Sirius and made a mental note to ask him later. Approaching the headmaster's desk, where Dumbledore was waiting for him, Remus noticed a most magnificent bird perched beside what looked like a Sneakoscope. The bird had an outstanding plumage of red and gold and long tail feathers.

'Ah, I see you have met Fawkes. I trust you know what kind of creature he is?'

'Is he a phoenix, sir?' Remus asked, staring at the bird in awe.

'He is indeed! And pleasant as he may be, it is not because of him that I have summoned you here today. Please, take a seat,' Dumbledore said, pointing to the empty seat on the other side of his desk, which Remus took.

'Now, Mr Lupin, as I'm sure you are aware, the full moon is little under two weeks away and I wanted to explain to you what will happen when the time arrives for your transformation to take place. Madam Pomfrey!'

At this a kind looking woman entered and smiled at Remus before taking a seat next to Dumbledore.

'Mr Lupin, this is Madam Pomfrey, the school matron and nurse. On the night of the full moon, one hour before your transformation, you will go down to the Hospital Wing and meet Madam Pomfrey there. She will then take you out to the Whomping Willow.'

'I thought you said all students were forbidden from going near the tree, sir? You said so at the start of term feast,' Remus asked, at which Professor Dumbledore smiled.

'I'm glad you don't talk as much as your friends Mr Potter and Mr Black, as I'm sure they were paying no attention to my speech at all. But in response to your question, you are an exception to the rule, Mr Lupin. I promise you will not receive detention for going there with Madam Pomfrey,' Dumbledore smiled. 'There is a knot in the trunk of the tree which, when pressed, will freeze the branches temporarily, giving you enough time to enter the tunnel situated just by the roots. This tunnel will lead you to a large building near Hogsmeade called the Shrieking Shack where you will transform and be collected again in the morning.'

'Near Hogsmeade? What if I get loose? I could bite anyone!' Remus said, looking worried.

'I myself have put enchantments on the building to ensure that you will not be able to leave and no one else will be able to enter until the full moon has passed. You, and everyone else, will be completely safe,' the headmaster answered, smiling kindly.

A sudden realisation made Remus put his head in his hands and groaned, 'The Whomping Willow was planted for me, wasn't it?'

'Yes, for your protection and for those around you,' Madam Pomfrey said, speaking up for the first time. 'Now, if you will follow me, I will show you the way to the Hospital Wing so you will know how to get there when the time comes.'

She stood up to leave with another smile to Remus, who turned to Professor Dumbledore and said a quick 'Thank you sir' before following the nurse out of the office and down to the hospital.

'I can't believe Remus missed the whole of Transfiguration,' said Peter.

'Lucky him. That McGonagall can be a right battleaxe,' Sirius hissed.

'I got told that she was strict but honestly, she surely can't be serious about taking 10 points from us for having a bit of fun,' James huffed.

'Well, you were trying to transfigure each other instead of the match you were given-'

'SHUT IT, PETE!'

'Why, what's he done?'

James, Sirius and Peter jumped to hear the unexpected voice behind them. Remus looked at them with large, curious, slightly amused eyes.

'Why were you at Dumbledore's office, Remmy?' Sirius asked.

'Remmy?' Remus said, crinkling his nose. 'Don't call me that, my name is Remus.'

'It's called a nickname, Remmy. But that doesn't answer my question. What did Dumbledore want?'

'Just, um, I, that I, erm, that, my dad was attacked when he was working,' Remus improvised.

'Oh God, Rems, I'm sorry. He's an Auror, isn't he? Is he ok?' James asked with genuine concern in his voice.

'Yes, yes he is. But yes, he'll be fine. Professor Dumbledore just thought it best that I found out through him and not through someone else or the Daily Prophet.'

'Yeah, of course. Well, we brought your bag with us. But we'd better hurry up or else we'll be late for Potions,' Peter reminded them.

The four set of to their next class, chatting as if nothing had happened. Remus joined in, but he couldn't help but think that he had just lied to his friends and he felt awful about it, yet he knew that he would have to keep doing it. His whole life was a lie because he was a monster. A lying monster pretending to be someone else. Remus was a terrible liar and he knew it. How was he supposed to keep it up?

Safe in the thought that the full moon was a whole two weeks away, he pushed the thought to the back of his mind and walked onwards with his friends, ready for the rest of his first day of classes at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.


	6. The Night Before the Full Moon

**CHAPTER 6: The Night Before The Full Moon**

For the most part, the next two weeks of Hogwarts passed by quickly without much changing. James and Sirius, after being forced to study and do a dreaded thing called homework by Remus, learnt a new jinx and promptly tried it out on Severus Snape, the boy from the train. He was, as predicted, sorted into Slytherin, which only intensified Sirius and James's dislike for him. Peter would cheer them on as they complained about him or jeered at him or jinxed him but wouldn't actually join in and Remus would simply sigh and look away, not taking any part in it. At times, Severus would try and retaliate and end up only making things worse for himself. It wasn't long before the two Gryffindors had turned it into a sort of sport. It had already earned them a grand total of three detentions and a loss of a countless house points. In fact, as they were going to bed one night the conversation had already turned to the Slytherin boy.

'How about this? Tomorrow, we send him a Howler!' Sirius suggested, his eyes lighting up. 'Teach the git to mind his own business and not laugh when I got mine.'

'Can't you just leave him alone?' Remus suggested.

Both Sirius and James spun around to stare at him, with shock in their eyes.

'Remus John Lupin! How very dare you suggest such a thing?' James cried dramatically.

'This is war, Remus!' Sirius added.

'How is it war? What has he ever done to you? I hate to say it but it's bullying,' Remus said, not looking up from the book he was reading.

'Well, it's more the fact he exists,' James replied, earning him a raised eyebrows look from Remus.

'He laughed at my Howler. Made fun of me for it for ages, he did! I can't let him get away with that,' Sirius threw in looking more determined than ever.

Realising it was a lost cause Remus sighed and left the dormitory to read his book down in the common room in peace. He sat down in his favourite seat next to the fire and resumed where he had left off.

'Remus?'

The small boy looked up to see the red haired girl that he saw on the train.

'Oh, hello, Lily,' he replied, grateful that he had remembered her name. He was proud of that. He was quite good with names.

'Where are your friends?' she asked.

'In our dorm. They kept distracting me so I came down here,' Remus answered, looking at her over his book.

'You're not like them Remus.'

The boy felt his heart alternate between stopping beating and beating a thousand times a minute. The full moon wasn't until tomorrow, how could she possibly have found out already? He hadn't even spoken to her until now, if she had figured it out, who else had? The boy's breathing picked up and he started to feel dizzy, his eyes darting around.

'Remus? Are you ok?' Lily looked at him, concern in her eyes and walked over to kneel in front of him. 'What's wrong?'

'I…you…how…what do you mean?' Remus managed, closing his eyes, trying to get the room to stop spinning.

'The way that they are always picking on Severus for absolutely no reason, the way that they do nothing but muck around in class, the way that they don't do homework, the way that they don't seem to care about anyone but themselves? You aren't like them Remus. You're a nice person. I don't understand why you are friends with them, really,' Lily explained, watching Remus who still had his eyes closed. 'Remus, are you ok?'

He sighed with relief, became even lighter headed with joy. He felt faint after panicking so much, but opened his eyes to the spinning room and smiled at Lily.

'Yes, I'm fine. Just a bit dizzy, that's all,' he said, deciding that she deserved to not be lied to; especially after the compliments she had just given him. He smiled at her, and as she smiled back he wondered if they were friends now. Having had hardly any friends when he was growing up because of his lycanthropy, Remus found it difficult to understand the concept of friendship. He liked having friends, he was glad that he had friends, but he was never sure how it was that he had come to be friends with them. How could one tell if they had made a friend? Had he now found a friend in Lily Evans?

'Do you want me to go and get someone?' she asked, holding onto his arm for support as he made to stand up.

'Oh no, I'll be fine,' he replied as he headed off towards the stairs back up to his dorm. 'I think I'll just go to bed now.'

'I'll help you up,' Lily said, walking behind Remus with her hand on his back.

'Really you don't have too-'

'Stop arguing and get to your bed, Lupin,' Lily ordered, with such a Professor McGonagall tone to her voice that Remus laughed and was still laughing when he opened the door to his dorm. He turned to say goodbye to Lily but she walked straight into the room behind him.

'Evans! To what do I owe the pleasure?' James said, turning around to grin at the girl.

'I didn't come here to talk to you, Potter. I was just saying goodbye to Remus,' she replied, stony faced.

'Well then please do so and kindly leave, Evans, you're interrupting our chat,' Sirius said, with a smirk and a quick gesture to the door.

'Oh yes, planning another attack on Severus, no doubt!' Lily huffed. 'You are pathetic. Goodbye Remus.' And with that she walked out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

James, Sirius and Peter all turned around simultaneously to stare at Remus who was sitting on his bed with his head down trying to stop himself from feeling so dizzy. Stealing a glance out of the window he could see the swollen moon, almost at it's full. 'It's full moon tomorrow,' he thought. 'That'll be what this is.'

'Remus. What were you doing with Evans?' James shot at him, taking the boy aback with the change of subject.

'She was downstairs when I went down. We were talking. Is that alright, mother?' Remus answered, not lifting his head and taking deep breaths.

'Remus, are you alright, mate?' Peter asked, looking at the pale boy with his head cocked to the side as if trying to perceive him from a better angle.

'Yeah, you look quite pale, Remmy. Paler than usual, I mean,' Sirius agreed.

'She hasn't cursed you or anything, has she?' James asked, worried.

'She's not like that James. She doesn't like cursing people for no apparent reason, and she also doesn't like people who curse other people for no apparent reason, which is precisely why she doesn't like you,' Remus replied.

Whilst James's eyes widened and he began to stutter a lot of nonsensical gibberish, Sirius and Peter looked at each other, then back at Remus.

'That doesn't answer our questions, mate,' Sirius pointed out.

'I'm fine,' Remus said.

'You're not a good liar, Remus,' Peter replied.

'I'm fine,' Remus insisted, not completely lying. His head was starting to clear a bit and it was making him feel better knowing how much his friends really did care about him. He crawled over to the front of his bed to get to his trunk, pulled out some pyjamas and stood up to go to the bathroom and get changed. His head spun as soon as he stood up but he tried to hide it as best he could and left the bedroom. Once inside the bathroom he slid to the floor and began to change slowly all the while muttering in his head about stupid dizziness, stupid moon and stupid lycanthropy. For as long as he could remember, he had always been ill the day of the transformation, which was tomorrow, but he couldn't afford to be. If he kept disappearing so much then people would get suspicious. People would get nosey. People would investigate. And people would find out.

James, Sirius and Peter were all sitting on James's bed and alternating between looking at each other and at the bathroom door. Remus had been in there a long time. It doesn't take anyone that long to get changed. Something was obviously happening.

'I'll go ask if he's ok,' James volunteered, getting up from the bed and beginning to cross the room but stopped dead halfway there when he heard a loud THUMP from the bathroom and then silence. Whipping around to share a worried look with Sirius and Peter who had jumped off the bed at the sound, the three ran to the door and started banging on it.

'Remus! Remus, what happened? REMUS!'

'He's locked the door!'

'Get out of my way!'

Sirius stepped forward with his wand and practically screamed 'Alohomora' in his frantic state and they heard the door unlock.

'Alohomora?' James questioned.

'When I was at home I read my textbooks to get out of being with my family,' Sirius muttered, pushing open the door.

'Blimey! Remus! He's fainted!'

Upon seeing the pale boy unconscious on the floor, the three gently grabbed hold of him and carried him onto his bed, Sirius getting his arms and James and Peter with a leg each. Once Remus was deposited onto his bed the three Gryffindors looked at him worriedly.

'Should we go and get someone?' Peter whispered, his face pale and his eyes frantic.

'We should give him some time until he wakes up and see how he is,' Sirius said. 'It might freak him out if he wakes up somewhere else and then he might faint again.'

'So we'll give him five minutes?' James suggested.

The three agreed and all sat my Remus's bedside. After two minutes he began to stir and with a groan woke up to see three worried faces hanging over him.

'I'd rather we didn't make this a habit,' Remus said weakly. 'You three aren't the best sight to wake up to.'

The boys didn't smile.

'You wouldn't have had to wake up to us if you hadn't gone and fainted in the bathroom,' Sirius frowned.

'We had to unlock the door,' Peter put in.

'And carry you out,' James added.

'Sorry,' Remus muttered, looking away. The glare of the moon seemed to be taunting him from outside the window and he didn't want to look at it.

Sirius sighed and scrambled up onto the bed next to Remus and was soon joined by James and Peter. Remus couldn't help but laugh at the three of them hanging off the edge and, in the case of Peter, grabbing onto the sheets for dear life, and soon enough they were all joining in.

'Seriously though, are you ok, Remus?' Peter asked.

'Yeah, I feel a lot better now, thanks Pete,' Remus replied. He wasn't totally lying. The room had stopped spinning so much but the intensity and almost fullness of the moon taunted him as his dizziness was replaced with a headache.

'What happened?' Sirius enquired.

'I don't know. I, um, I think I must have just stood up too fast or something,' Remus improvised, glad to see that his friends believed him. With a frown he realised that he must be getting better at lying. He wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not.

'Why didn't you just tell us that you didn't feel well?' James asked.

'I don't know. I didn't want to bother you, I guess,' the small boy replied.

'Remus John Lupin that is the most absurd thing I have ever heard! We're your friends, we're meant to look after you and care for you and all that. You better tell us the next time you're ill. That goes for everyone, in fact!' James scolded.

Remus laughed and told James how much he acted like a mother, which earned him a hit in the face with a pillow. Grinning, Remus retaliated and soon all four boys were ducking for cover and throwing pillows across the room, although no one would let Remus leave his bed. Eventually the night wore on and James, Peter and Sirius all fell asleep, blissfully unaware of the feeling of dread that the thought of tomorrow night brought for their friend. Remus sighed, rolled over and closed his eyes knowing that he would need all of his strength for the night that awaited him the next day.


	7. Remus's Nightmare

CHAPTER 7: Remus's Nightmare

_Remus was in the forest behind his house, gazing up at the full moon with large blue eyes. He sat on the grass, looking up at the stars and feeling the flowers underneath his hands. With a recognisable pop, the small boy heard his father apparate home from work. Twisting around where he was sitting, he turned to see his father hastily push his way into the house, looking nothing short of terrified, and slam the door shut behind him, not realising that his son was outside. The boy shrugged and went back to staring up at the skies._

_Time passed and Remus was woken from his daydream by the sound of the door bursting open. John Lupin was scanning the forest frantically calling for his son at the top of his lungs. The boy stood up and looked at him with wide-eyed curiosity._

'_Remus! Get inside! Quickly!' John called, the urgency in his voice clear._

_Worried, the boy hesitantly began to jog towards the house. Halfway there, a large, strong creature pounced on top of him and held him against the ground. Its massive paws crushed his ribs whilst its claws tore along the terrified boy's stomach. Excruciating pain tore through his whole body and Remus began to scream and try to tear away but was held down to hard. _

'_HELP! HELP ME! PLEASE!' he screamed as the animal tore its way through his arm. The small boy felt a hot liquid surround him and panicked. He turned his head to look at his arm and immediately wished he hadn't. A huge chunk of his flesh had been practically excavated from him and the bone was visible through the river of blood. His head began to spin and he squirmed harder than ever, screaming at the pain from his upper body._

_The creature suddenly kicked out its back legs and came down hard on Remus's leg, and a sickening crack echoed around the forest as the bone snapped clean in two. The worst scream exploded from Remus's lips and red sparks began to fly past his face. John Lupin was charging towards the beast that was attacking him, firing spells and shouting incoherent strings of words. In one swift movement, the creature raised itself onto its hind legs and pushed John away, the strength behind it sending the wizard flying backwards a good few metres._

_Remus raised his head to look at the animal and saw that it was a wolf with the most terrible long sharp teeth and blood dripping from its coat. Remus's blood. The boy began to scream once more as the wolf bent its head down and bit into Remus's shoulder. More pain than he had ever experienced ripped through his shoulder and he felt blood seeping into his hair._

'_PLEASE! PLEASE, SOMEONE HELP ME! PLEASE!' he cried, slightly weakly as he began to fall out of consciousness._

_The wolf looked down on him and Remus could swear that it was grinning. 'Now you're a monster,' he heard it say. 'A monster, just like me.'_

_Remus continued to scream long after the world went black._

'HELP! HELP ME! PLEASE!'

James woke with a start and tumbled out of his bed, onto the floor. Untangling himself from the curtains he looked around the room. Sirius and Peter were slowly waking up as well and pulling their curtains apart.

'Who's getting murdered?' Sirius asked groggily, squinting in the dark to see James.

With a look at the other two boys being awake, James knew whom the cry had come from. Getting up off the ground he ran over to Remus's bed, followed instantly by Sirius and, a little bit behind, Peter. James wretched open the curtains whilst Sirius lit the bedside lamp to see Remus flailing about covered in cold sweat, tears running down his face and fast asleep. The three wakeful boys shared a worried and confused glance at each other that was quickly interrupted by a heart-stopping scream.

'REMUS!' James started yelling, grabbing at his friends arms to stop them from flailing about so much. 'REMUS! WAKE UP!'

Sirius got onto the boys bed and sat on his legs to stop them from kicking James in the face and Peter grabbed onto the sleeping boys shoulders, yet Remus continued to scream.

'We've got to wake him up!' James said through gritted teeth, using all of his strength to keep the boys arms down. For someone so small and weak looking, Remus was really very strong.

'REMUS!' Sirius bellowed, but to no avail.

Peter looked around, not quite knowing what to do, and promptly ran into the bathroom, returning with a glass of water which he placed on Remus's nightstand.

'He'll need that when he wakes up,' he explained.

'If he wakes up,' Sirius corrected. 'REMUS! PLEASE WAKE UP!'

'PLEASE! PLEASE, SOMEONE HELP ME! PLEASE!' Remus shrieked, his head coming right off the pillow as he struggled against whatever force was holding him down in his dream.

'Remus, please wake up,' Peter cried, feeling tears sting his eyes as he looked down on his friend, scared of what was going on.

'REMUS!' James and Sirius screeched, their throats hurting for the decibels they kept emitting.

'We need to go and get someone!' Peter shouted. 'Someone else will know what to do!'

James looked at Peter and leaned over past his shoulders and tipped the contents of the water onto Remus's head.

With a strangled sort of noise from gasping and screaming at the same time Remus bolted into sitting upright in his bed, coughing from the water and promptly vomited off the edge of his bed. The three boys jumped backwards and let go of their friend. Remus lay there, coughed weakly and relaxed his tense muscles, defeated.

Sirius, Peter and James hesitantly walked forwards.

'Remus, mate, don't lie like that,' James whispered, and Remus obediently rolled over onto his back. His face was so pale it was tinged with grey; his hair was matted and stuck to his face with the sweat that covered his face. His yellow eyes were closed and his tears finally stopped as he breathed deeply.

Sirius climbed onto the bed and sat on the edge of it. After Remus didn't object, James and Peter joined him; so all three were sitting cross-legged on the boy's bed, watching him worriedly.

'Remus. Remus, are you ok?' Sirius asked, reaching forward and putting his hand on the boys arm. He flinched at how cold it was but didn't pull his hand away.

Remus opened his eyes but didn't speak. He looked at his friends and opened his mouth as if to speak but turned once more to vomit off the edge of his bed.

'Oh Merlin, right, come on,' James said, standing up. 'We've got to get him to the bathroom. Remus, mate, can you stand up?'

The pale boy looked at him blankly as if he didn't register what had been said but pulled back the covers and swung his legs around. He heaved himself into a standing position and the three boys noticed that he was shaking. Remus tried to take a step and swayed dangerously. Sirius ran over and Remus felt strong arms around his waist. James ran to the other side of the boy whilst Peter went to open the door and get Remus another glass of water. Once inside the bathroom, James and Sirius carefully let go of Remus who slid to the ground and pressed the back of his head against the cold tiles of the wall and closed his eyes once more.

'Remus? Can you hear me, mate?' James asked.

'Hmm?' Remus replied, opening his eyes slightly. James tried not to flinch at how empty they looked. 'I'm sorry I woke you guys up.'

'Don't be, mate. Its fine,' Sirius told him, trying to hide the worry in his eyes.

'What's wrong, Remus?' Peter asked, passing him the glass of water.

'Nothing, just a nightmare, that's all,' Remus replied, taking a sip of the water with difficulty as his hands were still shaking.

'Want to talk about it? It must have been pretty horrible,' James murmured, taking the glass from Remus's hands.

'No, it's fine. I just want to sleep,' the pale boy replied.

'Ok, mate. We'll give you a hand back to bed, yeah?' Sirius said, his tone soft. He slung Remus's arm over his shoulder and place his own around his friend's waist, James mirroring him on Remus's other side. Peter placed the glass on Remus's nightstand and emptied their bin out of the window, placing the empty bin next to Remus's bed.

'Just in case he's sick again,' Peter explained after receiving confused looks from James and Sirius. Sirius nodded and, after helping James settle Remus down, used a vanishing spell to get rid of the vomit from the ground. Almost as soon as his head hit the pillow, Remus closed his eyes and his soft breathing indicated that he had fallen asleep. James, Sirius and Peter looked at each other and, in that moment, they knew that none of them were going to get any more sleep that night.

Each of them clambered onto their own bed. They had left the curtains of Remus's bed open and did the same with their own. James sat crossed-legged in the middle of his bed, Sirius lay on his stomach with his hands supporting his chin and Peter got into his bed and pulled the covers up but propped himself up on his elbows and they all turned and looked at Remus. The way he had been so pale and so terrified had scared them. What could he possibly have dreamt about that had made him physically ill? As hard as they tried, they couldn't get the image of the pale boy screaming, sweating, crying and thrashing around out of their heads and they looked at him, worried. Occasionally, they would see the boy twitch in his sleep and would be ready to run out of bed to help him again, but it would pass as soon as it came. The three Gryffindors stayed awake all night observing their friend, and barely noticed as the moon disappeared and was replaced by the sun of the next morning, bringing with it the day of the full moon.


	8. The Full Moon

**CHAPTER 8: The Full Moon**

The sunlight shone through the window of the first year Gryffindor boy's dormitory. James stirred and rolled over, opening his eyes. He looked over to see Sirius lying on his stomach with his hands under his chin.

'Damn it! Sorry, Sirius, I must have fallen asleep!' James said.

'It's ok. I think we all did. I woke up an hour or so ago. Peter's still sleeping,' Sirius explained, gesturing to the lump on the bed opposite him.

'Has he been ok?' James asked.

'I think so. I got up and checked and he's not been sick again. He doesn't look too tangled up so I'm guessing that he hasn't been tossing and turning much. I think he's just exhausted,' Sirius replied, looking over at Remus's sleeping form.

The alarm on Remus's watch started to go off and he and Peter began to wake. Peter sat up and rubbed his eyes and, on realising that he must have fallen asleep after all, mouthed a 'Sorry' to Sirius and James who smiled back at him. Remus pushed himself up on his hands and looked over at his friends who were all watching him with concern in their eyes.

'Morning,' Remus said. He felt awful. Even though he had already been sick, he was still nauseous and had a terrible headache. He felt really weak and irritable and he was very cold. Knowing that it was the full moon that very night he didn't want to appear out of the ordinary and smiled at his friends.

'How are you feeling, mate?' Sirius asked.

'I'm fine, just a bit tired,' Remus responded, knowing now that he was definitely getting better at lying.

'Remus, I don't think you should go to class today. We'll tell the professors that you're ill and you just stay here and rest,' James told him.

'Honestly James, I'm fine,' Remus smiled.

'Have you looked in a mirror today, Remus?' Peter asked, raising his eyebrows. After Remus shook his head in confusion, Peter continued, 'You're really pale, have massive dark circles under your eyes and I don't even have to come any closer to tell that you're all clammy.'

'I appreciate your concern, guys, but really, I'm fine,' Remus said, grabbing his robes and walking into the bathroom to get changed. The three boys shared exasperated looks and walked over to the locked bathroom door.

'Remus, I really don't think this is a good idea!' Peter called.

'Come on, just go back to bed,' James pleaded.

'With the state you were in last night, I'm sure the teachers won't mind if you take today off, even if you are feeling better,' Sirius told him.

Opening the door, a now changed Remus walked out of the bathroom.

'I don't think anyone else needs to know about last night,' Remus said.

'Mate, you fainted and you were sick. It's not a good idea to keep that to yourself. You're obviously ill,' Sirius said.

'Yes Sirius I was sick. Was. Past tense. I'm fine now. Can we just go to class, please?' Remus asked.

'Fine,' James sighed.

The four boys sat in their normal seats at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall. James, Peter and Sirius were all talking quietly, trying to hide the glances they kept giving Remus who was getting, if possible, even paler and wasn't eating anything. James couldn't keep quiet about it anymore.

'Remus, you have to eat something.'

'I'm not hungry,' the boy replied.

'Like hell you aren't. You barely ate anything yesterday and what little you did eat, you threw up last night,' Sirius scolded.

'Here, just have one bit of toast, please?' Peter asked, passing the food over and placing it in front of Remus, who looked at it and pushed it away. The other three boys sighed.

'Hi Remus,' came a voice and the four Gryffindors turned to see Lily Evans approach them. 'How are you fee-' she stopped talking abruptly as she saw Remus's pale face. 'Oh, Remus, you look awful!'

'Thanks, Lily,' Remus replied, raising his eyebrows at her.

'What are you doing making him go to class like this?' she whispered angrily to James, Peter and Sirius whose eyes all widened to stare at her contemptuously.

'Excuse me? We told him to stay in bed! It was his bloody choice to get up; we couldn't very well tie him down, could we?' Sirius hissed back at her whilst James and Peter shared angry looks.

'You could have at least tried to make him stay, look at the state he's in!' she retorted.

'Well, we're all so terribly sorry Evans; perhaps you'd like to try and convince him to get back to bed? Obviously we didn't even TRY and make him! Oh wait, I'm pretty sure I remember all three of us telling him to for about half an hour this morning! But if you think you can do a better job, be my guest!' James shot at her.

'Yeah, we do actually care about him, you know! There is a little thing called 'friendship' that despite what you may think, we do take very seriously,' Peter joined in.

'Guys, shut up!' Remus sighed. 'I've got enough of a headache as it is without listening to you four going at it!'

'Well, get back to bed, then! Maybe then we'll shut up,' Sirius said.

'Fine!'

Remus stood up and swayed slightly. The four Gryffindors rushed to his side and all made it up towards Gryffindor tower together.

Remus got back into bed with his robes still on and glared up at the three boys and Lily, who, once again, had let herself into their dorm.

'Happy?' Remus asked stubbornly.

'Yes,' all four of them replied simultaneously.

'We're going back down to breakfast now. We'll bring you up some food at lunch and I don't expect to see you leave this bed, ok?' James instructed. When Remus didn't answer, he nodded and the four Gryffindors left the room.

James, Peter and Sirius headed to Defence against the Dark Arts after breakfast, with Remus still on their minds.

'Only Remus would be that ill and still want to go to class! I'd love to get out of class for a day!' Sirius said.

'Yeah, I often wonder how he's in Gryffindor. I'm glad he is and all that but really, he's got Ravenclaw written all over him,' James agreed.

'He's probably sitting up there in bed worrying about the notes he's going to miss rather than resting like he should be,' Peter sighed.

Remus, however, was not worrying about missing notes at all. In fact, after his friends had left the room, he gave them five minutes to get well away from Gryffindor Tower as they headed down to breakfast, then left the common room and headed straight to his first class. He was sitting in his seat, waiting for the rest of the class to arrive when his three friends opened the door and entered. When they saw him, they stopped dead and stared at him in exasperation.

'Lupin! What the hell do you think you're doing?' Sirius hissed as he stormed over and took his seat next to the pale boy.

'Going to class. I believe that is the point of school,' he replied calmly.

'Oh, ha ha, very bloody funny,' James said, glaring at Remus.

'Honestly, for such a smart guy, you can be a right idiot sometimes,' Peter sighed, looking at Remus as if he's gone completely insane.

Remus just shrugged and turned to the front of the class as the lesson began. He knew that he shouldn't have come but it seemed the only option that he had. Professor Dumbledore had explained in his letter all those months ago that if Remus wanted to miss classes the day before and the day after his transformation, the teachers would not mind in the slightest but Remus wasn't worried about getting into trouble. If he were continually ill the day of the full moon it wouldn't take long before someone worked it out. At least if he only disappeared at night, not many people would notice, but if he missed classes, practically the whole year would notice and he couldn't afford to let that happen. He was grateful for his friends concern but he just couldn't miss any lessons. He didn't know how he could ever possibly make them understand, but they just had to leave him to it.

The first two classes of the day passed by quickly with the three boys trying very hard to ignore Remus, which proved to be much more difficult than they had originally thought and they all walked to lunch together talking as normal. They all sat down in their usual seats and tucked in with Remus, as expected, not eating a single thing.

'Remus, really, you're being an idiot,' James sighed.

'You've got to eat something, mate,' Sirius agreed.

'Yeah, you'll just end up fainting again,' Peter said.

'I don't feel like eating,' Remus told them, truthfully. His nausea was getting worse and his head felt like it was going to split in two. If he was being totally honest with himself, he didn't think he would be able to pick up any cutlery with how weak he was feeling.

'Which roughly translates into 'I feel sick',' Sirius said.

'Which roughly translates into 'I should have stayed in bed',' James added.

'Which roughly translates into 'James, Sirius and Peter were right and I should have listened to them',' Peter piled on.

Remus simply glared at them.

'Well, we've got Transfiguration and then a free period before dinner, so you only have one more class left,' James told him, his tone softening.

Remus nodded and the three boys looked at him expectantly but when he still didn't eat anything, they sighed and began to talk amongst themselves again.

'Today we will be continuing with our work on trying to transfigure a match into a needle. I assume you all remember the spell, if not it is on the board. Proceed!'

Three of the four Gryffindors were sitting in their seats at the back corner of the classroom talking animatedly without even attempting to transfigure the matches on their desk. This being Remus's first ever Transfiguration lesson, he rolled his eyes and his friends and turned his attention to the wooden splint in front of him. With the correct wand movements, he muttered the incantation and saw the sharp metal form of a needle in front of him.

'Very well done, Mr Lupin! 10 points to Gryffindor!' Professor McGonagall said, having seen the magic. 'Could you come here for a minute, please?'

Remus stood up and walked over to the teacher who gestured into a large cupboard behind her desk at the front of the classroom. The boy nodded and followed her into it.

'Mr Lupin, it is purely your choice and I'm glad that you care about your education enough to do this, but I feel obliged to tell you that you don't have to come to class the day of your transformation if you don't feel up to it.'

'I know. I just didn't want to give people any reason to be suspicious about why I wasn't there and why I'm always missing on the day of the full moon. I thought if I showed up for classes, less people would notice if I disappeared at night. I can't have anyone finding out,' Remus explained.

'That is your decision, but I want you to be completely honest with me when I ask you if you truly feel up to this today?'

'I'm ok. I feel a bit weak and ill, but one can only expect that when affected with lycanthropy. I've been dealing with this since I was four, and it's not really any worse that it usually is,' he replied.

'Well, if you're sure. You may go Mr Lupin,' the stern teacher dismissed. Watching him retreat back to his seat in the classroom her gaze softened. He didn't deserve this.

The four friends all sat together at dinner and, of course, once again Remus wasn't eating anything. For the first time, the three chose to not say anything just looked at him with raised eyebrows. After dinner was over Remus stood up and swayed so much he had to sit back down again.

'Right!' Sirius said, grabbing the thin boy in his strong arms, 'Hospital Wing with you!' and proceeded to drag the smaller boy all the way there.

'MADAM POMFREY!' James yelled when they entered the room.

The kind looking lady bustled out of her office. 'You can't shout like that in here!'

'Sorry,' Sirius said. 'We were just bringing you this twat who was ill last night yet refused to stay in bed, eat, or come here even though we've been telling him to all day.'

'All right, you leave him with me. Come on, Mr Lupin. You boys can leave now. I'll look after you friend for you,' Madam Pomfrey said, taking hold of Remus's arm.

Once James, Sirius and Peter left, Remus sat down on one of the beds and waited for the moon to rise.

The tunnel was very dark. Madam Pomfrey lead him to the door, wished him luck and left, promising to come and get him in the morning.

Remus watched her leave and opened the door in front of him to see a large, spacious room. It was at least five times bigger than his basement at home and there were no chains to hold him down. He liked it, and prayed that the wolf did too. He sat in the middle of the floor and waited for the moon to come.

A jolt of pain shot across Remus's chest and he cried out. Sickening snaps echoed around the room as each of his bones broke and reformed. Claws tore their way through his hands and feet, ripping the skin and bleeding. His spine pushed out against his skin, stretching to the point when it was almost torn as a tail appeared. Small droplets of blood were pushed out of the boy's pores all over his body as fur erupted over his skin. Remus screamed and rolled around on the floor, pain shooting through every part of him like fire. Tears rolled down his face as his cheekbones snapped and his jaw broke and everything went black. Where the boy had been now stood a huge wolf with yellow eyes darting around the room searching for a human being to sink its teeth into. It didn't recognise this place. It hadn't been here before. It ran around the room looking for anything it could bite, anything it could eat. Upon finding none it threw itself against the walls, windows and doors trying to escape, eventually turning on itself. The wolf clawed and bit itself until it could taste blood and continued all through the night.

As the sun began to rise again, the wolf's bones snapped and its fur seemed to be pushed back inside itself, turning back into pale skin. Its organs crushed themselves back together and its howling merged into screams of pain. After a few minutes of excruciating pain, Remus was lying on the floor of the room, bleeding and broken until he passed out and the world went black once more.


	9. Slytherin Versus Ravenclaw

CHAPTER 9: Slytherin versus Ravenclaw

'Remus, dear, can you hear me?'

Remus opened his eyes to a very white room.

'Where am I?' he asked, weakly.

'You're in the hospital wing, love. Try not to move about too much. I've done the best I can with your wounds but I can't heal them fully,' Madam Pomfrey said apologetically.

'It's ok, I'm used to it,' Remus rasped. His throat hurt a lot and he was losing his voice. Suddenly he began coughing painfully and pain shot across his chest. Madam Pomfrey bustled by with various potions and dipped them into Remus's mouth and his breathing eased up.

'What's the damage?' he wheezed.

'You've broken quite a few of your ribs, your wrist and your leg. At some point you tore across your chest, and there is a gash on your face, but it's not very deep so I think your hair can hide it. I've done my best with your wounds but I'm not sure about your broken bones. I don't know if they will heal properly or not, because you were the wolf when it happened, I was waiting for you to wake up before I done anything with them so you could tell me quicker whether it was working or not. You've been unconscious since I found you, it's quite late on the next day now,' she told him.

'I've missed a whole day?' he groaned.

'Yes, but it's the weekend. You didn't miss any classes. Mr Lupin, should I try to heal your bones, now?'

'Oh, I forgot! Great! Right. Ok, just give it a shot,' the young werewolf told her.

Madam Pomfrey poured a goblet full of foul tasting liquid into his mouth and he swallowed it reluctantly. Immediately he felt his bones popping back into place and fusing together. It was painful, but he managed to sit up afterwards and inspect himself.

'I think it worked,' he said.

'I'm going to put your arm in a sling just in case. Your wrist seemed to have splinters of bone missing so the potion may not be complete and it will come in handy if another part of the bone fuses onto another unexpectedly,' she explained.

After administering the sling and giving Remus a potion to drink periodically over an hour, Madam Pomfrey finally let the boy leave and he limped up to the Gryffindor Common Room, dreaming of his bed and a long deep sleep. Though of course, when he gave the Fat Lady the password and saw his three friends sitting by the fire he knew that he was going to have no such luck.

'REMUS!' Sirius yelled, jumping off the couch and running over to hug his friend, but stopped dead upon seeing the sling. 'What have you done to yourself?'

James and Peter, who had stood up at the same time looked at Remus and frowned. Sirius guided the boy over to his favourite seat by the fire and sat and simply looked at him.

'What?' Remus asked, confused by having three pairs of eyes stare at him and say nothing.

'What happened to you, Remus?' James asked. 'We went back to the Hospital Wing after dropping all of our stuff off in the dorm and we couldn't see you, or Madam Pomfrey.'

'Maybe you just came at the wrong time?' Remus suggested.

'Whatever, that doesn't matter. What happened to your arm?' Sirius demanded, gesturing to the sling.

'Oh, I, um, I think Madam Pomfrey left me to go and get a potion or something and I fainted and somehow broke my wrist,' Remus improvised, actually quite proud of his story.

'Why didn't she just fix it up, properly?' Peter asked.

'Oh, she did. The sling is just for support while the bone completely fuses together,' Remus explained, taking his arm out of the sling and moving his wrist around to prove a point and was glad to find that it didn't hurt very much at all.

'What, did the bone snap in two or something?' James asked incredulously.

'I think it must have done. I can't remember though, I wasn't conscious at the time.'

'Merlin, only you could pass out and snap a bone in half,' Sirius sighed.

Remus smiled shyly and put his arm back in the sling. He took out his potion and took one gulp as Madam Pomfrey told him.

'What's that?' Peter asked.

'It's a potion. It's to stop the nausea I think,' Remus said, coming up with the believable lie.

'Do you still feel ill?' asked James.

'No. I feel fine, just really tired and hungry.'

'Well there's a surprise!' Sirius grinned. 'You don't think that could possibly have anything to do with the fact that, assuming you haven't had anything today, you've barely eaten in three days?'

'Shut up, Sirius,' Remus said, stubbornly.

'Good thing we came prepared then isn't it?' Peter smiled.

'Yeah, we thought you might be hungry when you got back so we each sneaked some food from dinner last night and tonight,' James explained and as one the three boys produced handfuls of food and placed it on the table. Remus stared at the food, grinned and began eating immediately.

'I love you guys,' Remus said as the other three boys began to tuck in as well.

'We know, Remus. We know,' Sirius grinned.

Not for the first time three of the Gryffindors were woken up by an overly excited James jumping on their bed, shouting gibberish at the top of his lungs. Sirius, Peter and Remus all sat up, dazed and glared at the boy standing in the middle of the room with an annoyingly large grin on his face.

'What this time?' Remus murmured, ruffling his hair into place.

'Yeah, what gives?' Peter groaned, picking himself up after having fallen out of bed once again.

'This had better be important, Potter,' Sirius growled.

James stood there with his smirk and raised his eyebrows at his three best friends.

'Really? None of you can remember?' he asked, earning three confused looks.

'It's the first Quidditch game of the season! Slytherin versus Ravenclaw!' he explained, practically bouncing up and down on the spot with excitement. Sirius cheered and leaped out of bed, all tiredness forgotten and Peter sat up attentively whilst Remus rolled his eyes, sighed and pulled the covers over his head.

'REMUS! What do you think you're doing?' James cried, tearing the sheets off his friend's bed and causing Remus to sit up and glare at him.

'It's Slytherin versus Ravenclaw. Not Gryffindor. Why do we have to go?' he asked, groggily.

'I don't think you heard me correctly, Remus. I just said that there is a Quidditch game today. Who cares who's playing, it's Quidditch!'

Remus rolled his eyes again.

'I'd rather stay in bed, thanks,' he said, trying to grab his covers back of the bespectacled boy who was staring at him in disbelief.

'Have you ever seen a Quidditch game, Remus?' Sirius asked.

'No and I'd rather not start now-'

'Why not? Come on,' Sirius said, heading over to the boys trunk and pulling out clothes for him.

'No, Sirius, I don't like Quidditch.'

James and Sirius gaped at their pale friend as if he had gone mad. They turned to each other and opened and closed their mouths like fish, without any sound coming out, having been rendered completely speechless.

'How can you know that if you've never seen it?' Peter, who was already dressed, asked.

'PRECISELY PETER! Now Remus, hurry up and get dressed and we'll go and watch some Quidditch,' Sirius instructed, thrusting clothes into the boys hands before heading off towards his own bed to get changed himself. Remus glared after him, then sighed and went into the bathroom to get changed.

'LOOK AT NESS GO! WHO KNEW SOMEONE WHO WAS SUCH A BRAINBOX COULD BE SUCH A GOOD CHASER?' James screamed, standing up and practically hanging over the edge of the seating at the Quidditch match.

'NOT BAD LOOKING EITHER, ESPECIALLY FOR A RAVENCLAW!' Sirius yelled back, in the same position.

Peter was standing on his seat, cheering Ravenclaw and booing Slytherin as appropriate whilst Remus sat and read a book, confident that his friends would be too excited about the game to notice.

'I BLOODY HATE THAT SLYTHERIN BEATER! CHEATING SCUM! DID YOU SEE HIM PELT WATSON IN FACE THERE?'

'WELL, IT IS SLYTHERIN, WHAT MORE COULD YOU EXPECT? NO OFFENSE, MATE!'

'NONE TAKEN! I HATE THE LOT OF THEM BUT IF THERE'S ONE THING I REALLY CAN'T STAND IT'S CHEATING BASTARDS LIKE THAT!'

Amidst all of the screaming, cheering and booing James turned to Remus.

'SEE! WHAT DID I TELL YOU? ISN'T QUIDDITCH JUST AMA-REMUS!'

The boy looked up innocently. 'Yes, James?'

'WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING? HOW CAN YOU BE READING AT A TIME LIKE THIS?'

'WHO'S READING?!'

'REMUS!'

'WHAT?! GIVE ME THAT!'

Sirius turned and grabbed the book out of Remus's hands and stood on it.

'YOU'LL GET IT BACK AT THE END OF THE GAME! NOW STAND UP AND ENJOY YOURSELF!'

Remus sighed and reluctantly stood up. He cheered and booed at the appropriate time but put as much sarcasm in it as he possibly could, but secretly he was rather enjoying himself. He liked the way the chasers weaved in and out of each other, avoiding the opposite teams beaters, as they headed towards the keepers at either end of the pitch whilst the seeker looked for the Snitch. As hard as he tried, he couldn't stop himself from having fun and, by the end of the game found himself standing on his seat, brandishing a sign that he stole off Peter who had stolen it from someone beside him and booing as the Slytherin seeker wrapped his fingers around the golden snitch.

'SHIT!' Sirius yelled, whilst James was screaming a string of insults at every single member of the Slytherin team and Peter flopped down on the seat with a glower at the green players. Remus quickly dropped the sign and asked Sirius if he could have his book back which was angrily thrust in his direction. Grinning at his friends he grabbed their arms and pulled them away from the stands with the rest of the exiting spectators before their foul language earned them a detention.

'Is Madam Hooch blind?! Dolohov blatantly hit Monteith in the face with his bat on purpose! He bloody broke the guy's nose and Ravenclaw didn't even get a penalty? Cheating bastards!' James raged.

'And McNair pushed Spinnet off her broom and nothing! Not even a bloody blow of her bloody whistle!' Sirius added.

'And it was totally uncalled for when Nott hit the Ravenclaw Keeper in the stomach with a bludger! I know that Ravenclaw got a penalty, but what use is that when your goal posts are left open for the rest of the game?' Peter hissed.

The three of them turned to look at Remus, awaiting his input. The boy looked up at them innocently and asked what they were looking at him for.

'Well that was your first ever experience of a Quidditch game, what did you think?' Sirius asked.

'It was…Oh, I'm an awful liar. It was actually pretty good,' Remus sighed whilst the other three cheered and resumed their slander of all things Slytherin related and found himself joining in.


	10. Finding The Kitchens

CHAPTER 10: Finding the Kitchens

Peter Pettigrew walked along a corridor alone. James had decided that he was bored and wanted to have a treasure hunt and, with the help of Sirius and Remus, had somehow decided that he was a complete treasure, as were they all, so here Peter was, wondering around the castle trying to find them.

'I wonder how the normal people are spending their time this weekend,' he whispered to himself, just as he heard a clatter from behind a suit of armour.

'James? Remus? Sirius?' he called, edging forward just as a group of fourth year Slytherins, including Bellatrix Black, came around the corner.

'Ah, little Petey Pettigrew! Is that Sirius you were calling for? My lovely little traitor of a cousin? Be sure to tell me when you find him, I've been waiting to curse him since he first sat down at that bloody disgusting Gryffindor table with the rest of you scum. In fact, whilst I've got you here, I might test it out…' she grinned threateningly, drawing her wand and pointing it at him.

Peter looked up at the wand in his face, turned on his heel and ran as fast as he could, hearing Bellatrix's cackle following him and suddenly a curse flew past his ear. Peter had never been good at running as he wasn't incredibly athletic but somehow he managed to be sprinting down a corridor two floors below before he even fully registered that he had just had a wand in his face. Slowing down to catch his breath, he looked around not recognising where he was. Clutching a stitch in his side, he put one hand on the wall for support and pulled it away immediately as he heard the wall giggle. Whipping around he saw a large painting of a bowl of fruit, in which there was a squirming and giggling pear [the source of the noise], which turned into a handle before his very eyes. Peter stared at it in shock. He didn't want to go in, in case it was dangerous and he was on his own so he took a quick look around the corridor to remember what it looked like and ran off in search of his friends.

After half an hour of wandering around, Peter was walking along the Charms corridor. Remus peered around the corner to see him and, being incredibly bored of hiding for so long, stepped out and called 'Found me!' Peter spun around and ran up to Remus, shouting 'Remus, you've got to come with me! Remus, thank Merlin I found you, you've got to come quick!' Remus looked at him in alarm thinking that something awful had happened and took off running behind the already sprinting boy. On and on they ran until Peter finally skidded to a stop in front of a picture of a bowl of fruit down a corridor that Remus hadn't been to before.

'Look!' Peter said, pointing excitedly at the painting.

'Yes, Peter, it's lovely,' Remus replied, confused and looking at his friend as if he had gone mad.

'Touch the pear,' Peter instructed, causing Remus's eyebrows to be raised even higher up his forehead and he stared at his friend incredulously.

'No, thank you,' he said, completely baffled at what was going on.

Peter looked at him and stepped forward, placing his hand on the pear, and sprung back as it began to giggle and squirm and turned into a handle. Remus's eyes widened as he looked at the handle and asked Peter where it lead to.

'I don't know. I didn't want to go on my own, so I went and found you first.'

Remus stepped forward and pulled open the door into a dark corridor with another door at the end of it. Whispering 'Lumos' and walking forward with his lit wand in front of him, he heard Peter mutter the same incantation and close the door behind him. Upon reaching the other door Remus waited for his friend to catch up with him.

'What do you think is behind it?' Peter whispered, while Remus answered with a shrug and asked 'Ready?'

Peter nodded and pointed his wand at the door that Remus was about to open, ready to curse if anything unpleasant was behind it. Wrenching the door open, light spilled out from behind it and the two boys stepped inside.

'Hello, sirs!' came a squeaky voice from beside Peter.

There stood a tiny creature with large bat-like ears and eyes the size of tennis balls. Remus had never seen such a being and was grateful when Peter whispered in his ear 'I didn't know Hogwarts had house elves.'

'Hello,' Remus replied politely. 'What is your name?'

'I is Binky, sir,' the elf replied, bowing low so its nose almost touched the floor. 'What can Binky get for sirs?'

'Get for us?' Peter asked, looking at Remus who took a few steps forward to see around a wall. There were hundreds of house elves slaving over pots and placing food on four long tables, which looked suspiciously like the House Tables in the Great Hall. Realisation dawning Remus turned to Binky and asked 'Are we in the kitchens?'

'Yes, sir! Is there anything I can get for you?' Binky repeated.

Peter and Remus turned to look at each other in excitement and turned back to the house elf.

'Do you have any sausages?' Peter asked, as they were his current favourite food. Almost at once, three house elves came darting forward carrying massive trays full of the food and held them out, beaming, to Peter who happily took a handful and began eating.

'Anything for you sir?' Binky asked Remus, gazing at him happily with those large, green eyes.

'Do you have any chocolate?' he asked, smiling at the thought. 'And you don't have to call me 'Sir', my name is Remus.'

'Yes, master Remus!' Binky said, grinning widely and bowing once more as trays began to crowd Remus, laden with dark, milk and white chocolate. Peter and Remus turned to each other and beamed at each other.

'Binky, do you get many students down here?' Peter asked, his mouth full of sausage.

'No, sir. You two be the first in a few years,' the elf replied.

'We should probably be going,' Remus said, remembering that James and Sirius would probably still be hiding from Peter. 'Would it be ok if we took some of this with us?'

In answer to his question, a house elf came running up to him with two large bags and handed one to Remus and one to Peter with a squeak of 'Take as much as you'd like, sirs!'

After taking their fill, Remus and Peter turned to leave the kitchens, calling goodbye to the elves and thanking them very much. Once out of the painting and back to the school corridor, the two boys turned to each other and smirked.

'We'd better go and find Sirius and James,' Remus said.

'Yeah, it'll be easier with you helping me,' Peter replied. '...Trust you to ask for chocolate!'

'Hey! What's wrong with chocolate?'

'The obsession level is getting a bit worrying, mate,' Peter grinned.

Remus huffed at him and took another bite of chocolate. 'It's the best thing ever, Pete.'

Peter rolled his eyes, but grinned and the pair took off towards the Defence against the Dark Arts corridor, deciding to start looking for their other friends there.

'The kitchens?!' James yelled when all four of the young Gryffindors were safely back in their dormitory, helping themselves to the sausages and chocolate.

'It's incredible! There are all of these house elves and they are all really friendly,' Peter said, excitedly.

'A nice house elf? That makes a change,' Sirius grumbled.

'Really? My house elf is lovely,' James said, whilst Peter agreed that his aunt had a very nice house elf and he had never come across a mean house elf.

'Lucky you,' he huffed. 'We've got one at our house. Of course the family of the Most Noble and Ancient House of Black would never dream of doing any of the work themselves. We've had house elves for generations; my mother puts their heads on plaques at home after they die. The one we've got now, Kreacher, he hates me. I don't know whether to hate him in return or not, for all I know someone else in my family has ordered him to do so,' Sirius said, gritting his teeth and practically growling at the name of his house elf.

'Your family really do seem like fascinating people, Sirius,' James said sarcastically. 'I bet my dad will have a heart attack when I tell him that one of my best friends is a Black.'

Sirius grinned.

'You just wait. I'll get a Howler for the rest of my life when they hear that I'm friends with a Potter. Peter, you're a Gryffindor so you're screwed as well. And you, Remus, you filthy half-blood, they will LOATHE you!' he laughed, winking at Remus.

Soon enough the four of them were laughing at each other.

'But seriously, back to the task in hand, when are you going to go to the kitchens?' James asked, wiping tears of mirth from his eyes.

'Well, we can go tomorrow if you want, it's a Sunday,' Remus said, taking a bite of chocolate.

'If we can remember where it is…' Peter voiced quietly.

'You better! This is far too good a find to forget about!' Sirius gasped.

'I remember, it's ok, Pete,' Remus replied.

'Maybe we should make a map. Not a rubbish 'turn left, turn right' map, like a proper map of each of the floors, with every room and any other places we might find. Maybe there are secret passageways or something! And it should have show people as well, like where they are so we can find each other and avoid other people and spy on the teachers…'

James continued on like this, getting more and more excited and talking faster and faster until he just stared at his friends with wide eyes his mouth just opening and closing with no words left, grinning wider than ever.

'Honestly James, you get far too excited,' Remus sighed, but stopped when he saw Sirius grinning as well.

'That is the best idea I have ever heard! Think of how handy it could be!' he smiled.

'I don't think that's possible,' Peter put in, knowing that it was a good idea but not being able to fathom the complex magic required.

'Come on, I'm sure it is! We could research some spells and-'

''We' could research spells?' Remus interrupted Sirius, eyebrows raised,

'Well, you could go to the library for us, I hate that place. But if you bring books, I'll read them,' Sirius replied.

'Yeah, me too,' James added.

'And me,' Peter joined in.

Remus rolled his eyes and climbed into his bed.

'Well, it's not happening tonight, it's late. Can we go to bed, please?' he asked.

The three other boys sighed and climbed into bed themselves and put out the lights but each of them, even Remus, were laying awake thinking of possible ways that they could bring this map to life.


	11. Sirius Versus Slytherin

CHAPTER 11: Sirius vs. Slytherin

The four young Gryffindors walked out of Potions with their bags slung over their backs.

'I really can't be bothered with Transfiguration today,' Sirius grumbled, rubbing a painful blistering burn on the back of this hand from his cauldron about ten minutes before.

'Can you ever be bothered?' James asked, earning a shrug in reply.

'How's your hand?' Remus enquired, pulling his friend's hand closer to inspect it. 'You have to stop rubbing at it, or it'll hurt more.'

'Do you want to go to the Hospital Wing?' Peter asked, to which Sirius shook his head.

'Come on, we're going to be late,' James said, and all four quickened the pace and made it through the door just in time.

'Have a seat, boys,' Professor McGonagall said, gesturing to their usual seats at the back of the classroom, and then began the lesson.

After taking their seats, James, Sirius, Peter all turned to each other and started up a conversation whilst Remus took notes, as always. Towards the end of the lesson, a jolt of pain shot through Sirius hand and he hissed in pain.

'What's wrong?' Remus whispered, resting his quill to turn and look at his friend.

Sirius turned over his hand to see the burn from Potions had gone a nasty shade of purple with flecks of black and dark green. James and Peter gasped at it whilst Remus felt his mouth open in shock.

'You must have got some of the Potion in it,' he whispered.

'I think you should go to the Hospital Wing, mate.' James said, with Peter nodding his agreement.

'Want one of us to come with you?' Peter asked.

'No, it's fine. I'll be back in a few minutes, and class is almost over, anyway. I'll see you at the Common Room, yeah?' he replied, raising his hand to ask to be excused.

Sirius walked along the corridor alone when he heard a familiar cackle.

'Are you lost, itty bitty firsty?' Bellatrix Black, cackled, earning a laugh from the four friends surrounding her. 'Should you not be in class?'

'I could ask you the same question,' Sirius retorted through gritted teeth. He loathed his cousin. He loathed the whole lot of them, but she reminded him the most of his mother and, in his books, that was about the worst possible thing that she could do.

'Oooh!' Bellatrix laughed, along with her cronies. 'I've been meaning to have a chat with you, Sirius. I've not seen you since I was talking to Uncle Orion on Platform 9¾. I've not seen you since you turned into a Mudblood-loving blood traitor.'

Sirius felt his blood begin to boil.

'Look at you, standing there in your Gryffindor tie. Scum! That's all you are! It's all you ever have been. You're weak, and worthless, just like your scummy little friends! When will you start acting like the person you are? You're a Black, Sirius. You always will be. You'll never escape the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black, so stop trying, cousin. Just look at your friends! A Potter! How dare you! I bet Aunt Walburga doesn't know about that one. Be worth a lashing or two, don't you think? And what's the other one? Pettigrew, is it? Chubby waste of air, that's what he is. Completely useless! And then there's your other little friend. The half-blood filth! What's his name again? Ah yes, Lupin! Could you have picked worse?! Have you seen him? He's so small and weak. He doesn't deserve to come to this school; he doesn't deserve to learn magic. In fact, that's probably why you hang around with them, isn't it Sirius? So you can try and make yourself look big and strong next to them. HA! Wasn't he ill a few weeks ago, the Lupin one? What a shame…would have been better if it had killed him.'

Sirius turned and ran at his cousin, his wand remaining inside his robes. He forgot about magic, he just wanted to make her pay for what she had said. He had never been so angry in his whole life, and started landing punches into any part of her and her friends that he could reach. They all fought back, hitting him and scratching him. Rodolphus, Bellatrix's boyfriend charged forward and punched Sirius in the face before kicking him so hard in the stomach that he flew backwards a few feet. He lay there on the ground coughing from the blow, and feeling blood from his burst lip ooze into his mouth. Anger filled him and he stood and turned, wanting to attack her again, wanting to hurt her again, wanting to make her pay for what she said about his friends, especially Remus.

'PETRIFICUS TOTALUS!' Bellatrix screeched, pointing her wand at her cousin and cackling once again as she saw his limbs snap together. She saw the hatred in his eyes before he fell forward onto his face helplessly with a sickening and, for her, satisfying crack.

Rodolphus stepped forward and turned him over to see blood cascading out of his broken nose and going all over his clothes, face and the floor. He picked Sirius up and threw him in an empty cupboard nearby, making sure to hit his broken nose off the door accidentally on purpose.

The group of older Slytherins laughed, vanished the blood on the floor with a quick vanishing spell and left Sirius trapped, with his limbs still stuck together in the cupboard alone.

'You don't think anything has happened to him, do you?' Remus asked, looking around the room worriedly.

'Maybe we should go down to the Hospital Wing?' James suggested.

'It can't have been bad enough for him to still be there,' Peter said. 'We've been waiting here for almost half an hour. Madam Pomfrey can fix a burn like that in two seconds!'

'Yes, but if we go to the Hospital Wing and he's there, and then we'll know where he is. If he's not, then we'll ask Madam Pomfrey if he made it there or not. That way, if he did, we'll know he's ok and if he didn't…' James trailed off.

'If he didn't then we'll follow the route from Transfiguration to the Hospital Wing and will surely find him along there somewhere,' Remus finished off.

'Let's go then!'

Sirius's eyes darted around. It was so dark he couldn't see a thing. He could feel the blood from his painful nose running down his face and into his mouth. If someone didn't find him soon he would start to choke on it. He tried to stay calm and think about something to do but his mind was to busy panicking. His hand stung from the burn he got in Potions and he wondered if his friends would think to go down to the Hospital Wing to look for him. He could feel the blood on his forehead from when he was face down on the floor beginning to dry and turn crusty. He hated Bellatrix more than he thought was possible. He hated Slytherin house, and his stupid family name. No doubt Bellatrix would tell his mother about his friends, earning him a Howler in the morning and a lashing when he went home for the summer. He had decided long ago that he was not going to go back to his house on any of the holidays if he had the option of staying somewhere else. Home life for him was like hell. He was forced to pretend to believe something that he doesn't and act like someone who he is not. One toe out of line and it would be a lashing or some other form of torture style punishment. Once his mother locked him in his bedroom with no food for three days because he had been caught talking to a Muggle boy when he snuck down to a Muggle park. He didn't belong with his family, he was nothing like them, and they hated him in turn. Hogwarts was his home now. James, Peter and Remus were his family. Why couldn't his family just leave him alone and let him be happy with that?

'SIRIUS!' James, Peter and Remus called, having walked to their Transfiguration class and began to trace the route their friend would have taken.

'Times like these I wish we had that map I was on about,' James sighed, peering into an empty cupboard in disappointment.

'Guys, there's a split. Which way would he have gone?' Peter asked, pointing ahead to a point where the corridor split off into three different directions.

'Well, I guess we're going to have to take one each,' James said. 'I'll go left.'

'I'll go right,' Peter said.

'I'll just stay on this corridor then,' Remus finished. 'Ok, before we go, if we don't find him, head back up to the dormitory in fifteen minutes, ok?'

James and Peter nodded their agreement and set off in their own directions with Remus continuing forward.

Although he didn't want to admit it, Remus was starting to get very worried about Sirius. What if he had fainted on his way to the hospital wing or something? He found himself quickening his pace until he was flat out running, pulling open doors of cupboards and classrooms and scanning them frantically, with still no sign of Sirius.

James hadn't been in this corridor very often, and kept thinking that he had missed a door somewhere and would go backwards to recheck then sprint forwards in case he had wasted time by going backwards and then thinking he had missed something and going backwards, etc, etc. When Remus had first suggested only fifteen minutes he had agreed but thought that it wouldn't be long enough, only now the time seemed to drag by as James grew more concerned for his friend.

'If he's got himself hurt, I'll kill him,' he muttered to himself.

Peter timidly walked down the corridor he had chosen. He knew it well but walked slowly in case he missed something new. At times he would look over his shoulder in case somebody was following him, and he half expected it to be Sirius.

'I bet he's done this on purpose,' he whispered to himself. 'I bet he's gone and hid just to see if we'd go looking for him. But what if he really is hurt? What kind of friend am I to think that he is doing this as a prank? But it is the kind of thing he would do. But surely if he was doing this on purpose he would have gotten bored by now, I mean he's left class almost an hour ago now, and he's not the most patient of people. Unless he has no choice in the matter and is lying hurt somewhere…' Peter frowned in confusion at the internal argument and continued to look.

Remus was still running down the corridor, throwing open doors when he suddenly tripped and landed heavily on his back. Winded, he stood up, coughing and rubbing his back. Looking at the ground to see what had caused him to fall he saw a smeared trickle of blood coming out of the cupboard beside him. Praying that he was wrong, he pulled open the doors. Inside he saw a large figure, obviously unable to move, but difficult to decipher in the dark. Remus grabbed the figures arm and tried to pull it out of the cupboard, but couldn't. Its limbs were stuck together and, recognising the spell, Remus muttered the counter curse. The figure was immediately freed and fell to its knees inside the cupboard and crawled out, coughing. Remus gasped and knelt beside what he immediately recognised to be Sirius, his long hair matted with blood.

Sirius coughed the blood in his mouth out onto the floor, struggling to breathe. He was shaking and couldn't find the energy to stand up just yet. Sensing Remus kneeling beside him, Sirius turned and wrapped his arms around his neck in a hug of gratitude, but pulled away as another fit of coughing hit him.

'Sirius! Sirius, are you ok?' Remus asked, placing a hand on his friends back as he coughed up the last of the blood in his mouth.

'Fantastic, Remus,' he replied. 'Never better.'

He sat up against the wall with his friend. Remus looked across at him and saw that he had a black, swollen eye, burst lip and what looked like a broken nose along with various bruises and cuts across his face and neck. His hair was stuck to his face with sweat and his chest was rising and falling quickly as he tried to regain his breath.

'Sirius, what happened?' Remus asked, looking at each of his wounds individually.

'Bellatrix. She…big group of Slytherins…insulted you guys…said horrible things…I snapped,' he struggled, wheezing and clutching his stomach.

'Ok, it's ok, just calm down. Breathe,' Remus soothed, placing a comforting hand on his friends arm.

'Said such…horrible things. I tried to…fight them…Rodolphus…kicked…stomach…cursed me…there was a lot of blood…hid me in cupboard,' Sirius wheezed, light-headed and dizzy.

'It's ok, it's over now, you're going to be alright now,' Remus continued to soothe. 'Sirius, I think you should go to the Hospital Wing.'

'No! No. I just want…to go back to the dorm. Please, Remus…Take me home,' Sirius whispered, his voice muffled from his broken nose.

Remus raised his eyebrows at him calling their dormitory his home, but smiled sadly that that is how he feels about it.

'Ok, I will. But you have to promise me you'll go to the Hospital Wing tomorrow, yeah?' he said.

'Ok.'

Remus slung Sirius arm over his shoulder and helped him stand.

'You need to grow, Remus,' Sirius smiled, feeling his arm slide down as Remus' shoulder came up to his chest.

'Just walk, Sirius,' Remus sighed.

James and Peter were sitting on the couches in the Common Room. For once, it was almost empty because everyone else had gone down to dinner. The two of them were worrying too much to eat anything, and besides, they could just go down to the kitchens later. Now it was not only Sirius who was missing, but Remus too.

The Fat Lady swung open after Remus saying the password and he and Sirius staggered into the room. James and Peter jumped up but were frozen to the spot with shock and horror at the sight of Sirius. Remus nodded his head at the stairs and the four of them headed up to their dorm.

Remus, with the help of James, set Sirius down on his bed. Peter came out of the bathroom with a damp cloth, which he handed to Remus, who began dabbing the blood off his friend's face carefully avoiding his nose, which looked broken. Sirius took the cloth off Remus and began to do it himself.

'What the hell happened, Sirius?' James demanded.

'Slytherin house happened,' he replied, smiling slightly.

'What does that mean?' Peter asked.

'Bellatrix and a group of her friends were taunting him and he tried to fight them and they fought back, cursed him and hid him in a cupboard. I think his nose got broken somewhere along the line,' Remus explained.

'They broke his nose?' James hissed, eyes narrowing in rage.

'Leave it James, we'll get them back at some point, I'd rather it wasn't today though,' Sirius smirked.

'Sure, mate,' James replied, calming down with difficulty.

'Don't you think you should have gone to the Hospital Wing, Sirius?' Peter asked. 'We went there looking for you and Madam Pomfrey said that she hadn't seen you so you haven't even got your hand sorted out yet.'

'It'll hurt so much if you roll over in your sleep,' James said, as Sirius wiped off the blood around his nose.

'Right, get up, you have to change,' Remus ordered, as Sirius's nose started to bleed again.

Looking down at his bloodstained clothes Sirius nodded.

'Now, I don't know about anyone else but I'm starving,' James said. 'How about me and Peter go to the kitchen and get some food and you two can stay here.'

'Ok,' Remus agreed, and then turned to Sirius. 'And tomorrow, you are going to the Hospital Wing if I have to drag you there myself.'

Sirius smirked.

'I would love to see you try, Lupin. I really would.'


	12. Revenge Is Sweet

CHAPTER 12: Revenge Is Sweet

Sirius felt someone poking him in his side, groaned and woke up. Remus was standing over him with a damp cloth in his hand.

'Sorry I woke you up. You started bleeding again. I didn't want you to choke on it or anything,' he whispered, handing the cloth over.

'Thanks,' Sirius said, wiping his face. 'What time is it?'

'Around 3 or 4 in the morning,' Remus answered. 'James and Peter are still asleep.'

'I should bloody well think so,' Sirius grumbled. 'Why are you awake?'

'I don't know. I just woke up and couldn't get back to sleep again. I've been up for about half an hour,' he replied, lying once more. The truth was that, as a werewolf, he had heightened senses, and the smell of blood had woken him up.

'Pass me my wand, Remus,' Sirius said, muttering 'Lumos' when he got it. As the wand tip ignited with light he got up and walked into the bathroom, leaving the door open so Remus could follow if he wanted, which he did. With the added light of Remus's wand, Sirius washed all of the blood off his face in the sink.

'Do you want to go back to bed or do you want me to take you down to the Hospital Wing now?' Remus asked.

'Madam Pomfrey will be asleep will she not?' Sirius replied, gently touching his broken nose.

'Maybe, but she sleeps in her office at the Hospital Wing. It'll take her literally two seconds to fix you up and then she can just go back to sleep,' Remus answered.

'Alright then, let's go.'

'That potion tastes disgusting!' Sirius complained, as the pair headed back up to the Common Room.

'It's supposed to make you better, it's not supposed to taste nice,' Remus sighed, checking around the corner for Filch before continuing to walk.

'We have an excuse, mate. Filch couldn't give us detention for going to the Hospital Wing.'

'Yes, but he would still try,' Remus sighed, approaching the Fat Lady who began complaining about ignorant students waking her up in all hours of the morning. When they got back to the dormitory Remus's watch read that it was almost half past four in the morning. The pair climbed into their beds and lay awake, staring at the ceiling.

'Remus?' Sirius whispered into the darkness.

'Yeah?'

'You're a really awesome friend.'

Remus felt his eyes slightly tearing up. His friends meant everything to him; he would die for them but how long before they left him? He knew that he couldn't keep lying forever and sooner or later they would find out his secret, and then he would be alone all over again. How could he be a good friend when he lied to them so much, and kept so many secrets? He didn't deserve them, and they deserved better than him. Not for the first time, Remus closed his eyes and prayed that he was normal, wished that he was just like everyone else but he knew that he would always be a monster. Still, he smiled sadly and replied 'You too, Sirius, you too.'

'WAKE UP REMMY!' came Sirius's voice after what seemed to be ten minutes. Remus groaned and opened his eyes to the still very dark room. Looking over at his watch, he saw that it was only half past five.

'Go away, Sirius. M'sleeping,' he mumbled, turning over.

'NOOO! WAKE UP REMMY!' came the voice of James, leaping up on top of his friend's bed and jumping up and down.

'Go away, James,' Remus mumbled once again.

'WAKE UP REMUS!' Peter joined, poking Remus continuously in the side.

Sirius looked at the three of them and shook his head in dismay. If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. He stomped up to the pale boy's bed, gripped the sheet and yanked it off as hard as he could, causing James to back flip onto the floor and Remus shoot up into a sitting position simultaneously. James lay on the ground groaning.

'Ow,' he said.

Sirius shot a look at his best friend and burst into roars of laughter, closely followed by Peter and James. Remus sat up in his bed and looked at all of them through confused, half asleep eyes and wondered aloud what in the name of Merlin was going on.

'I've got a plan, Remmy!' Sirius grinned, looking incredibly proud of himself.

'Very well done, I do as well,' Remus replied.

'Really? Great! What's yours?' Sirius asked, grinning wider yet.

'That you all shut up and let me go back to sleep!' he said, trying to look angry but smiling a little at the sight of Sirius grin faltering a bit. 'Fine, I guess I'm up now anyway. What's your plan Sirius?'

'Is that it done, Remus?' James whispered, holding his lit wand above his head.

'Nearly. It just has to be left to brew and then one last ingredient added,' Remus whispered back.

It was the second night since Sirius revealed his plan, and the four young Gryffindors were crowded around a bubbling cauldron in their dormitory, heated by a little blue flame of James's making. Peter was slouched against his trunk, having fallen asleep about ten minutes previously while Sirius, James and Remus sat staring at the bubbling concoction with wide-eyed excitement. Even though he knew he should be completely against it, and he pretended to only be doing this for his friends but really, he couldn't wait! He was, however, able to hide it, unlike Sirius and James who were bouncing up and down where they were sitting.

'It'll be ready for tomorrow?' Sirius grinned.

'Yes,' Remus smiled back

Sirius smirked and the three still awake boys shared an evilly happy grin.

Peter entered the Common Room and threw himself down onto the couch with his friends. He had just been down to the kitchens and thus completing phase one of The Plan. His friends turned to look at him with wild, excited eyes.

'It's done?' James whispered, the anticipation in his voice almost tangible.

'Yes, everything's set,' Peter replied, grinning.

'Well, that's that then. Now we just have to wait,' Remus said, throwing his arms behind his head and relaxing.

'How can you be so calm, Remmy?' Sirius asked. 'I feel like I'm going to be sick with excitement!'

'If we act too excited, the teachers will notice and get suspicious and suspect us when it happens. I'd rather not get caught,' Remus replied. 'Plus, I'd rather not make myself feel ill for this, it's pointless. And don't call me Remmy.'

Sirius rolled his eyes at his friend and resumed staring into the fire. In a few hours, he would have his revenge, not only on his cousin and her group of friends, but the whole of Slytherin house.

The four young Gryffindors walked down to dinner that night, bouncing as they took a step. Within an hour, their prank will be done. Even Remus was finding it hard to contain his excitement. As they took their regular seats on the Gryffindor Table, they were too afraid to speak to each other in case they started shouting in excitement. Dumbledore's speech seemed to last for hours. Finally, the food appeared on the plates and everyone excitedly began to tuck in. Out of habit, the four boys started piling food onto their plates but never took a bite. Soon, they were thinking, any minute now…

Suddenly, a bellow rang out from the other side of the room. Everyone in the Great Hall whipped their heads around to see, one by one, all members of the Slytherin House cry out in shock as their hair turned scarlet and boils appeared on their faces. The entire hall, with the exception of the teachers, burst out laughing and the four perpetrators fell off their seats backwards onto the floor. The Slytherins stared at each other in shock and confusion, clutching their boil-filled faces and grabbing at their hair. Chaos erupted as the members of the green and silver house began to shout and scream and Sirius smirked when he saw tears of rage in his cousin Bellatrix's eyes. He looked around at his friends, all of them still lying on the floor trying to catch their breath from laughing so hard and smiled wider still. His friends meant the world to him, they were his new family and the fact that they helped him to do this meant more to him than anything else in the world. He looked once more at the Slytherin House, where it was thought he belonged, and felt a surge of hatred towards them all coupled with the thought that, as he looked at their ridiculous scarlet hair and painful boils, revenge was sweet.


	13. As If I'm Almost Normal

CHAPTER 13: As If I'm Almost Normal

It was a week after the prank on the Slytherins and no one suspected the four young Gryffindors. The house members' hair and skin had gone back to normal a few days previously but the trick was still the talk of the school. Sirius and James were desperate to reveal themselves as the perpetrators to the rest of the school but Remus kept talking them out of it with the help of Peter, who usually sided with Remus on anything logical.

After the glory of their last prank, the four friends had begun to plan another. It was this that they were doing late at night in the Common Room on Friday night. James, Sirius and Peter had their heads almost touching, pouring over a potions book whilst Remus was attempting to read up on various useful spells and charms but his eyes just wouldn't focus. The moon hung low in the sky, intimidating and ominous, with the threat of the full moon the next day but for the first time in his life, Remus barely noticed. He was too engrossed in planning with his friends that he barely noticed that his head was spinning slightly and he had a headache. All he was thinking about was the next move he and his friends were going to make. He knew that he should be completely against most of what they were doing, especially if they were only ever targeting Slytherins. He knew what it was like to be targeted for something that you couldn't help, just because it was part of who you were and he didn't like that that was part of what he and his friends were doing. Still, he couldn't help himself. For once, he was included, he had friends and he was happy. It was as if he was almost normal.

'Remus, look at this one,' Peter said, shoving the book under his friends nose.

Remus squinted at the page, waiting impatiently for the letters to arrange themselves into words.

'I think you need these more than I do,' James laughed, taking off his circular glasses and offering them to his friend.

'I'm just tired, I can't read anymore,' Remus sighed, pushing the book away.

Sirius's head whipped up and, with a concerned look, he rushed over to the pale boy's side and put his hand on his forehead.

'What are you doing?' Remus asked, backing away slowly, slightly worried for his friend's sanity.

'It's just that you actually pushed a book away from you and refused to read anymore. I thought that meant that you were ill or dying or something…' Sirius explained, a slightly mischievous glint in his eyes behind what looked like genuine concern. 'And you do actually feel like you have a fever, Remmy. Do you feel alright?'

'Yes, I'm fine Sirius. Except don't call me Remmy,' came the reply, which Remus was surprised to find wasn't completely a lie. He didn't feel nearly as bad as he usually did around this time and he had, in fact, genuinely forgotten about it all, which made him feel so happy. With a smile he pushed himself out of his lounging position and heaved himself to his feet.

'We can work on this in the morning, ok? I'm too tired to think right now.'

Remus lay awake in his bed, staring at the ceiling, concealed behind his closed curtains. It was strange. He was thinking about various spells and incantations that he and his friends would find useful instead of his lycanthropy that he knew would hit him hard tomorrow. His subconscious was afraid to sleep in case he had another nightmare, which wasn't uncommon around the time of the full moon, and so kept his mind alert, awake and busy by thinking about various pranks he could pull off. His was starting to notice his head spinning and his headache was progressing to the verge of a full migraine but he seemed to be able to block it out. Still, so he wouldn't worry his friends in the middle of the night, he slithered out of bed, vanished the contents of the bin and set the empty container next to his bed in case the luck he seemed to be having didn't last through the night. As he done this, he listened to the slow breathing and snores from his friends and for the first time didn't feel as different from them. He knew that he was a monster; he knew that there was no real cure for him, but what if his friends were somehow saving him? What if their friendship suppressed the wolf inside him? He smiled at the thought as he crawled back into his bed and resumed staring at his ceiling, feeling sudden fatigue wash over him. He nestled his head into his pillow, beginning to feel the effects of the full moon, but grinned into the darkness. For once, he had hope that he had always been too afraid to feel. The hope that his friends were saving him.

For what he thought was the first time ever, Peter was the first one to wake. It was getting deeper into autumn so although it was always dark in the mornings now, he could tell it was not yet early enough to call it the next day. He pushed himself up into a sitting position and drew the curtains around his bed. From his bed he saw the moon still high in the sky, even though it was morning. He didn't really like winter. It was so cold and dark and depressing looking. He was looking forward to Christmas, where he might go home and see his family, but other than that he disliked the season altogether. He looked out across the Hogwarts Grounds. The view from Gryffindor Tower really was stunning. The grounds stretched out as far as the eye could see, the grass shimmering in the combined light of the moon and stars as the dew froze into glimmering crystals. The soft clouds in the sky littered the deep navy doorway to space and Peter imagined flying. Not with a broomstick, he was worse than hopeless on a broom, but just in the air, feeling the cold breeze through his hair as his fingers trailed the soft, fluffy edges of the clouds…

He was awakened from his reverie as the sound of coughing came from the bathroom. Peter spun on the spot, now facing away from the window and turned to look at the bathroom door. The coughing continued sounding weak and hoarse. Peter looked around the room and saw that all three of his friend's curtains around their beds were pulled over, so he couldn't see who it was in the bathroom. He hovered, unsure whether or not to offer his help. The hoarseness made him think that it might be Sirius who, whilst appreciating the concern, would want to be left alone. Peter, unsure if he was being a horrible friend or not, silently climbed back into bed, drew his curtains and waited for sleep to come once more.

Remus had his thin, trembling arm thrown over the toilet for support as the effects of his lycanthropy hit him at full force. He shivered uncontrollably and longed for the warm comfort of his bed, but knew he had to wait until he had stopped emptying out the contents of his stomach. Despite the full moon hitting him hard, Remus was still adamant that he was right, and that it wasn't as bad as it usually was. He kept convincing himself that his friends were unknowingly helping him that everything was going to be all right for once. Finally, he half crawled back into his bedroom, bringing with him the newly emptied bin, which he set beside his bed once more. He was unsure if he would even be able to speak tomorrow, all of the coughing and acid burning his throat from the vomit had made him hoarse, but he didn't care. As long as he had his friends by him, like any normal person.

'Hurry up! We're going to be late!' came the voice of James Potter, loud as always. Remus's head was felt like it was splitting and his throat was killing him but he sat up and smiled, grabbing his clothes to get changed in the bathroom as he always does. Peter groggily sat up, rubbing their eyes whilst Sirius threw his sheets off him and got up.

'Why don't we ever learn to just set an alarm like normal people?' Peter grumbled.

'Now, Peter, what's the fun in that?' James replied, a mischievous twinkle in his eye.

'And who the hell wants to be normal? It's much more fun being different!' Sirius laughed, throwing clothes on. 'Where's Remus?'

'Getting changed in the bathroom, like he always does,' James sighed. 'I don't understand why he does that. We're his friends; we're not going to laugh at him or something.'

'Maybe he's just uncomfortable around all people, not just us. He's not exactly the trusting type,' Peter suggested, shrugging.

'I just can't help feeling that he still doesn't trust us the way that he should and I don't understand. Sometimes I get the feeling that there is something big that he isn't telling us, something important, and I just feel worthless sometimes because I can't help him…' James trailed off; his eyes filled with confused sadness and looked towards the bathroom door. 'I just wish he realised how much we care about him.'

'I know what you mean, mate. Just give him time, I'm sure he'll get there,' Sirius reassured.

Peter looked up from getting his tie in knots and looked at Sirius, suddenly remembering last night. 'Sirius, are you feeling ok?'

'Me? I'm fine. Why?' Sirius replied, sharing a confused look with James, who shrugged.

'Oh, it must have been a dream then…' Peter replied, glancing at the bathroom where his friend was still concealed silently, and wondered if Remus was ill again and hiding it from them for some reason or if it really was just a dream.

James and Sirius exchanged matching grins of mischief and, speaking in high pitched voices, began to poke at Peter and ruffle his hair cooing 'Aw, Peter are you having dreams about Sirius?' 'Aw, are you dreaming about me little Petey?'

Unbeknown to his friends, Remus, with his werewolf hearing, had heard the entire conversation, and smiled sadly. He wished that he could open up to his friends, he really did and he knew that they would do his best to help him, were it a normal situation or problem. But, despite how often he pretended, or wished, or even prayed, Remus knew that he would always have this secret. He just wished it wasn't so hard. He leant his forehead against the door, sighing, and a single solitary tear ran down his cheek. Single. Solitary. Just like him. Then, with a flick of his hand, it was gone, vanished forever.

'Want a sandwich, Remus?'

The four were sitting down in their regular seats at the Gryffindor Table at lunch. The smell from the food was inviting, but made the thin boys stomach churn. He was still pretending to be absolutely fine to his friends, but he felt positively awful. He felt very weak, ill, and he had a splitting headache. His vision was slightly blurring, and he was getting steadily dizzier.

'What's going on?' James asked his friend. 'You didn't eat anything at breakfast, either. Are you feeling ill?'

'No, I'm just not hungry,' Remus replied with what he hoped was a convincing smile.

'You don't have to pretend for us mate. You look really pale,' Sirius added, hiding his alarm as best as he could. He had only just got a good look at his friend and, although he was used to his constantly pale complexion, he looked literally chalk white.

'Honestly guys, I'm fine. You don't have to fuss over me.'

James, Sirius and Peter shared exasperated and confused looks. Peter had genuinely confused himself into not knowing if he really had dreamt someone being ill in the bathroom, so decided not to mention it but could swear that as the four stood to leave, he noticed Remus stumbling.

The room was just as large as he remembered. This time, however, there was month old dried blood all over the walls and floor and some of the furniture was broken. The first time he was in here, he liked it, he found hope in it, but now it scared him. The tall walls intimidated him, made him feel so much smaller and insignificant. He was sitting in the middle of the floor, his legs pulled up to his chin. He had lasted the whole day today. All through all of his classes, all through dinner, everything! He was quite proud of himself for that. It was getting increasingly difficult to pretend that he was ok but somehow he managed. Remus gazed up at the window in front of him and did a double take. It was the moon. The full moon, shining high and he hadn't changed. Here he was, in human form. The boy stood up, hardly able to believe it, his heart leaping in his chest. He knew it! He knew that his friends were somehow saving him! He just knew it! Remus grinned, felt a tear run down his face. He had done it! That was his last thought before his eyes rolled back into his head and he fainted.

Fire! Ripping! It was a pain that cannot even begin to be comprehended. Snapping and grinding sounds echoed around the room with the howls that turned into screams as a semi-morphed creature writhed on the floor, still tearing at itself with deformed hands until a small, fragile framed boy lay on the blood soaked floor, the red liquid all over his body. His yellow eyes lost their glazed look and he looked around the blood stained room, defeated. He felt tears spring to his eyes.

'I guess I didn't make it then,' he whispered, the tears falling freely. 'It was as if I was almost normal.' And with that he fainted once more and the world went black.


	14. You Are My Family

**CHAPTER 14: You Are My Family**

Remus didn't wake up until three days after the full moon and wasn't released from the Hospital Wing for a further two. After taping him up, Madam Pomfrey reminded him that his cover story for this week was that he had gone home to visit his mother who had fallen ill. Remus hated lying, but nodded anyway and made his way up to Gryffindor Tower.

'I'm sure he'll be back soon,' Peter said, after waking up once more to find Remus's bed still empty.

'You don't suppose his mother died, do you?' James whispered anxiously. 'He's been gone for such a long time.'

'I hope he's ok. He didn't say what his mother had, did he? What if it's contagious and he's caught it?' Sirius worried, pacing the room. 'I mean, have you seen him?! It doesn't look like his immune system is exactly up to scratch.'

'Don't say that Sirius. Remus is smart. If it was really contagious he wouldn't just go and put himself in danger,' Peter replied, trying, and failing, to sound reassuring.

'Dammit Sirius! You've got me worried now!' James fretted, joining his best friend with the pacing.

'If he's gone and got himself killed, or really ill, I'll kill him!' Sirius announced, flopping down on his bed in frustration and exhaustion.

Remus was surprised to find the Common Room so empty for a weekend, but then remembered that today was the day of the Hogsmeade trip for all of those above third year. He was happy that he could slip by the few remaining first and seconds years dotted about and head up to his dormitory unnoticed. Using one hand, Remus pushed open the door of his dorm and was greeted immediately with a loud cry of 'REMUS!' and found three young boys running at him full speed, but pulling up short just before they reached him. Sirius frowned and looked him up and down with a scrutinizing eye.

'What have you done to yourself, Remus?' he asked, concerned.

The pale boy was standing at the door, leaning heavily on the doorframe. His right arm was heavily bandaged and in a sling, whilst his left hand was littered with tiny red cuts. A piece of bandaged tape went across his cheek and a small visible portion of his neck was heavily bruised. His mysterious yellow eyes were weighed down with heavy purple shadows and he looked absolutely exhausted.

'Nice to see you too, Sirius,' Remus replied with a raised eyebrow.

'Come sit down, mate, you look exhausted,' James said, offering out his arm for support as Remus was still leaning on the doorframe for dear life.

Sirius and Peter watched as Remus refused James's arm and limped heavily to his bed, where he flung himself onto his back and hissed in pain.

'What happened?' Peter asked, watching as Remus pushed himself up into a sitting position, his face slightly contorted with the pain he was trying to hide.

'I thought you were visiting your mother?' Sirius added, sceptically, taking in all of Remus's visible wounds, and frowning as the tape on his face began to slowly turn red with fresh blood.

'Is she ok?' James continued, feeling that it was rude to not ask.

'She's, um, she's recovering well. She's out of the danger zone for now. Obviously we're not getting our hopes up but we're pretty sure she's going to be alright,' Remus said with a smile. He had rehearsed this in his head so many times that the words tumbled out of his mouth without having to think of it. The day of his transformation, Dumbledore sent him a blank letter using one of the old school owls and Remus told his friends that his mother was ill and he had to go and visit her. That was almost a week ago. Since then he has been talking with Madam Pomfrey about illnesses that his mother could have and the healing potions that she would be taking so that he was prepared for any questions that they may ask him.

'Yeah, but what happened to you?' Peter repeated, reaching forward to push back Remus's light brown hair, revealing a half healed cut down the side of his face, from the middle of his forehead down to his ear. Although he was being gentle, he felt Remus flinch at his touch.

'There was a … gang of Muggles. They attacked me,' the boy improvised, hoping that he had managed to hide the momentary look of panic that he felt cross his face as he realised he didn't have a rehearsed story for this question.

'WHAT?' Sirius yelled. 'Why did they do that?'

'I don't know. They just started chasing me and I obviously didn't run fast enough,' Remus whispered.

James stood up at that point and gently wrapped his arms around his friend. He didn't want to hug him too tightly because he could feel the edges of bandages under Remus's clothes. A sudden wave of hatred surged through James's body. How dare anyone hurt his friend this way?

'Why didn't you go to the Hospital Wing and get yourself fixed up?' Peter asked, frowning at the still reddening tape on Remus's cheek.

'My cousin took me to a Muggle hospital. They gave me some injections and stuff, and it could interfere with anything that Madam Pomfrey gives me,' Remus explained smoothly. He had been prepared for that one. He looked up at his friends and saw Sirius sitting on the edge of his bed, his head in his shaking hands. 'Sirius, I'm ok. Honestly, calm down. I'm alright.'

'Calm down? Calm down?! Are you being serious, Remmy?! Look at what they've done to you! No one is allowed to hurt you! No one is allowed to hurt any of you!' Sirius scowled, beginning in a whisper, which steadily crescendo'd into a yell and then back down into a whisper. 'You're the only family I have.'

With that he buried his head back in his hands, and fell silent. James and Peter shared confused, worried looks whilst Remus heaved himself up onto his unsteady feet and limped over to his distraught friend. Without a single spoken word, Remus wrapped his arms around his friend and was soon joined by James and Peter. For Remus this was not the first time Sirius had expressed how much Hogwarts meant to him. He had once referred to their dormitory in Gryffindor Tower as his 'home' and now his friends were his family. Remus smiled sadly. What a bunch of misfits they all were. Sirius must have a horrible family for a random group of three boys to mean more to him. In that moment, the four friends felt more connected than ever before and realised just how much they all meant to each other.

'Do you want a hand, James?' Remus asked, as he watched his bespectacled friend haul a massive pile of books into their dorm with Peter carrying a cauldron behind him and Sirius with a pile of potion ingredients bringing up the rear. His friends had resolutely refused to let him carry a single thing as his arm was out of the sling but still quite heavily bandaged.

'Remus, stop trying to be helpful,' Sirius instructed. His face was half obscured by the mountain of various plants and other ingredients.

'I'm not quite sure I understand,' Peter said. 'We're going to use a potion in a prank before we leave for Christmas, but we don't know what potion it is, what we're going to use it for or which book it's even in?'

'That's right!' James replied cheerily, tossing the books onto his bed.

Peter placed the cauldron on the floor and Sirius dropped the ingredients inside. Remus limped forward and pulled some of them out.

'I've never even seen some of these before, never mind used them in a potion,' Remus muttered, turning over an odd looking green plant with brown veins along its strange leaves. James leant over and pulled out a very colourful flower, which was soon snatched away by Sirius, who twirled it in the air and presented it back to his black haired friend with a 'Jamesy, my love, will you accept this flower?'

'Oh, Sirius!' James cooed in a high-pitched voice. He reached up and accepted the flower from Sirius, making a great deal of sniffing it, and then sneezing.

'Bless you,' Remus smiled, whilst Sirius and Peter smirked.

'What kind of flower is that?' James asked, taking another tentative sniff.

'I don't know. I can't find anything matching its description in here,' Sirius said, flicking through a large book with the title 'Plants and their Properties.'

'We're using ingredients and we don't even know what they are?' Peter asked, beginning to look worried.

'Well, if they kill us then we'll know not to use them again, won't we?' James replied, winking.

Sirius laughed at Peter confused expression and helped Remus arrange the miscellaneous ingredients into the empty cauldron so that they wouldn't fall out and hid the stash under Sirius's bed.

'Well, let's get started then,' he said, grinning with excitement.

James began to idly throw the books across to Peter and Sirius and passed them gently to Remus. The four boys excitedly skimmed through the pages, ideas for pranks filling up their heads. They couldn't very well leave for the Christmas holidays without a bang now, could they?


	15. Leaving With A Bang

CHAPTER 15: Leaving With a Bang

James was sitting with wide, excited eyes as he watched Remus add more ingredients to the bubbling potion that they had been working on for three days. He sometimes did wonder why it was Remus that was brewing the potion. The pale boy could beat his friends in every single subject, but James and Sirius destroyed him in Potions. Aside from Peter, he was the worst at the subject.

'Remus, Remus, Remus, did you remember to add the dried Billywig stings?' Sirius asked, reading over the instructions for the millionth time.

'Yes, Sirius, I did,' Remus replied calmly, even though Sirius had been asking him similar questions for the entire duration of the potion brewing and he was beginning to get sick of it. 'Listen, why am I even doing this? You know I'm not the best at potions.'

'Remus, my friend, myself and James are lazy,' Sirius sighed, flopping onto his bed.

'Oh, don't I know it,' his small friend replied, flipping his light brown hair out of his eyes and yawning. He had been working on the potion since 3am and could feel his eyelids getting steadily heavier.

'Ok, I think that's that. We've just got to leave it to brew again and then add a few more ingredients and it's done!' Remus announced, to the excitement of his friends.

'When does it stop brewing?' Peter asked, leaning over the steaming cauldron to gaze at the bubbling pale blue potion.

'Erm…5am tomorrow morning,' Remus replied, adding the numbers up in his head.

'5am?!' Sirius repeated incredulously, raising his eyebrows and his voice shooting up an octave.

'It was 3am this morning,' Remus yawned, lying back onto the ground.

'Right, well I'll get up for it tomorrow. It's not fair on Remus,' James offered, tossing a pillow at his small friend. 'You can go to sleep if you want, mate. We'll bring you up some food from the kitchens if you miss dinner.'

With a grateful smile, Remus grabbed the sheets off the bed closest to him, which happened to be Peter's, and fell asleep right there on the ground, without even bothering to get up.

Sirius looked over at him with a raised eyebrow.

'Well, I guess we'd better get out of here then, so we don't wake him up,' he said, standing up and dragging his other friends out of the dorm.

'So, tomorrow's the night,' James whispered across the table to Sirius, and turning to share an eager grin with Peter beside him.

'Let's run over the plan again,' Peter suggested.

'Good idea Pete. Right, so first you will go down to the kitchens and get the house elves to put the potion in all of the food-'

'Even ours?' Peter asked, frowning in confusion at his friend.

'Yes, that way we won't look suspicious. If everyone gets pranked except us then it's kind of obvious that we did it,' James explained in a low voice. 'Continue, Sirius.'

Sirius explained the rest of the plan in whispers to James and Peter who nodded and grinned. This was going to be one Christmas prank that wouldn't be forgotten in a while.

The next day dragged on slowly. The four friends were getting ever more impatient but tried to remain calm to as not to draw attention to themselves. It was the last day before they would all separate for the Christmas holidays and they were looking forward to their last day of mischief together. It was with this thought in their heads that they practically bounded into the Great Hall and took their usual seats. Although they were all doing a good job of not looking to out of the ordinary, Remus could feel Sirius's leg shaking with anticipation under the table. He smiled. He was going to miss his friends over the holidays. He had initially planned to stay at the school over the holidays but his transformation was only a few days from now and he knew that it would be better to transform at home and avoid any suspicion.

Sirius was so excited. The majority of this plan was his idea and, if they pulled it off, the four Gryffindors would forever be legends for it. He wanted to have one last bit of fun before he went back to Grimmauld Place for Christmas. He didn't want to go, he intended to stay, but his mother got threatening in her letters and he didn't have much of a choice. Sirius couldn't imagine a worse way to spend Christmas. It was going to be a horrible few weeks away. He thought about all of the letters he didn't send, the fight he had with Bellatrix and the fact that he was a Gryffindor now. 'Most people will be going home to presents,' he thought. 'I'll be going home to a beating.'

Peter couldn't wait to go home. He loved Hogwarts and he loved his friends, but he did miss his family, especially his mother. His father worked long hours at the Ministry of Magic and with Peter at school, she would have been alone most of the time. He didn't know much about his father; only that he's never around. Sometimes on the odd occasion when he was home, Peter would hear his mother crying and the two of them arguing. On nights like these he would pull the covers over his head, close his eyes, and pretend none of it is real. He loved his father; he just didn't understand why he made everything different. His mother loved him too, but all they seemed to do was argue and Peter hated arguments. Hopefully it won't be like that this year. Hopefully things will be better.

James could barely sit still. This was going to be the best prank ever. And then he could go home for Christmas! Christmas was amazing in his house. His parents throw a massive party three days before Christmas and then again on New Years Eve. James intended to invite Peter, Sirius and Remus when he had got the proper details from his mother and grinned at the thought of a member of the Most Ancient and Noble House of Black in the Potter household. He had made all of his friends promise to write over the holidays because, for some reason, he got the feeling that he was the only one really looking forward to it.

James felt someone kick his leg under the table and looked up to see Sirius grinning wildly and winking at him. Dumbledore had just finished his speech. It was time.

Wands already in hands, the four Gryffindors began their prank. Sirius flicked his wand, whispered the incantation and all of the lights went out and the Great Hall plunged into darkness. A few students screamed, but that was nothing compared to what was coming. In an instant blue flames filled the Hall, eating up the Christmas trees, and lining every possible space of floor that was not occupied. Remus grinned at his handiwork. He liked making these flames. Right on cue, a blood curdling howl rang out through the hall courtesy of Peeves and by this point, most of the pupils and even some of the teachers were panicking and frantically trying to see around the Hall, and cowering away from the flames. Sirius grinned. This next bit was his favourite part. With a whispered 'Wingardium Leviosa' James began to levitate away from the Gryffindor table up to the front of the Hall where everyone could see him. He hung above the flames limply until he was sure all attention was on him and began to jerk around wildly, crying out in pain and stealthily releasing droplets of red wine from the kitchens to make it look like he was bleeding. Remus began to shout out, calling his name, acting frantic and worried, although he knew that there was nothing to worry about. Soon after, people began to join his lead, calling out to James, screaming, shouting, panicking. James raised his head a fraction to see the red hair of Lily Evans staring at him with wide terrified eyes, calling his name. For reasons he couldn't comprehend, this gave James a strange, warm feeling in his chest and he fought a smile as he let out a heart stopping yell and crashed to the ground, falling into the flames. It was chaos. Everyone was now screaming. James crawled through the flames. Remus really had outdone himself this time. Instead of burning him, the flames merely warmed him up, almost as if he were in a very strange blanket. Once he reached his seat on the Gryffindor Table, he slipped a note next to Peter and continued, leaving the Great Hall. When he was outside, he pulled out an old doll that they found discarded in Gryffindor Tower one day. It had been altered and dressed up to look like Santa Claus. James took out his wand and enlarged the doll until it was about the same height as Hagrid. He performed a second, more difficult spell that he had been researching and practicing for months, and the Santa doll came to life and walked into the Hall whilst James headed up to the dormitory, since he was supposed to have been burned to a crisp. As soon as the Santa doll entered the Hall, the flames disappeared and the room lit up once more. The massive Santa Claus walked right up to the teachers table and presented Dumbledore with a wrapped gift and disintegrated without any explanation.

The silence that followed was almost comical. After the screaming and crying and chaos, having no sound at all sounded completely absurd. Dumbledore opened the gift to find a small note that read, 'Watch out for the turkey.' After reading this out, the students leaned away from the food in front of them. Once again, a few people screamed as the food seemed to be rippling before their eyes. The food continued to ripple and grow to twice its normal size when it all exploded and confetti filled the room. The entire school was stunned into silence, and Remus, Sirius and Peter had to duck underneath the table to try and control their laughter. When they resurfaced, Dumbledore had restored the food with a flick of his wand and everyone was cautiously eating. Peter picked up the note beside his elbow.

'I hope that went as well as we expected. Talk about leaving with a bang! Now don't forget to bring me up some food!'

Remus, Sirius and Peter ran into their dormitory, laden with food from the kitchen to find James sitting in the middle of the floor. The four looked at each other and burst out laughing. They laughed and ate the food all night, whilst filling James in on how the rest of the prank went.

'There was a girl that I saw, I think she was in Hufflepuff, but it was hard to tell it was so dark, but she actually started crying when you fell into the flames!'

'I meant to say Remus, well done mate, those flames were extraordinary!'

'I think we should make this a regular thing!'

'I can't wait to tell my cousin all about it tomorrow night!'

The four boys heaved their luggage off the train and walked towards their families. How strange it was going to be, to be apart from each other for so long. They all turned to wave and caught each other's eye. They knew that they were all thinking the same thing. It was going to be horrible to be separated.


	16. Letters

CHAPTER 16: Letters

Dear Sirius,

How is life at the residence of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black? I hope your family isn't being horrible to you! It's strange not having you here, not being at Hogwarts. There's no one to rudely awaken in the mornings!

I really miss you and Peter and Remus. My parents just don't understand my humour like you all do!

How was Christmas? Thanks for the dungbombs by the way, they were fantastic! I may or may not have had a bit for fun with them down in the Muggle park by my house. I hope my present didn't get you in any trouble with your family, I don't think I really thought it through… Still, I'm sure you would have appreciated the meaning behind it!

I'm working on getting you out of your house and over to mine, but I'm not sure on the details yet so I'll let you know more about it once I know more about it.

Don't let your family get you down, mate!

James.

**Dear James,**

**Life at the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black is horrible as always. I've spent most of my time shut up in my room so I don't have to see my family. I've actually gotten so bored; I've done all of my homework already! I'm turning into Remus here! Since I have well and truly disgraced the family name by becoming a Gryffindor my parents have decided to either ignore me or shout and scream at me. They seem to have completely thrown away any attempt to be civil, but really, it's better that way. Kreacher is still being a prat, but other than that, life here is actually slightly more bearable.**

**Christmas was awful. My lovely other members of my family came around and I was forced to sit next to Bellatrix and Rodolphus and directly opposite from Narcissa and that Lucius Malfoy guy that she's still dating. He's good for her, I suppose. Obsessed with blood purity, the whole lot of them. If looks could kill, I would have died so many times that day. Still, I don't care. I hate them even more than they hate me.**

**Don't worry; I had the sense to keep the presents from you, Pete and Remus in my room so my family didn't know I had them. I think it pleased them to think that my friends didn't care enough to send me a present. But thank you for the Gryffindor posters, they were amazing! I've redecorated my room in the time I've spent shut up in it alone. I think you would like it; it has a certain lion, red and gold theme. My mother absolutely hates it, which makes it even more delightful! I have to have you over to see it sometime! In fact, no, it's probably best you don't come within a twenty-mile radius of my mother. The woman is a hag.**

**No rush or anything mate, but I hate it here. Although, when I do go to yours, your parents will surely fall in love with my sheer charm and just invite me to stay with you permanently!**

**Sirius.**

_Dear Sirius,_

_It's strange being able to wake up whenever I want without you or James jumping on my bed and Peter yelling in my ear, but I've found that I strangely miss it. We've only been at Hogwarts for one term and it already feels odd to be away from it, almost as if my home is not my home anymore, Hogwarts is._

_I wish I could invite you over to my house to get away from your family but my parents are always away so I can't ask them. My father works even more now, and my mother is always away at her new job so I'm always home alone. The rare times they come home they are always too tired to do anything with me so just disappear off to bed and leave me to it again. They've only ever been home at the same time once and I heard them arguing. It was horrible. Although I'm not always alone in the house, I suppose. I found an old forest trail down in the woods outside my house and it leads to a lovely little Muggle village with a park and Muggle shops and a library. I don't ever stay for long and I don't think my parents know that I go there, but it's nice to be able to get away and the currently snow capped mountains make up such a picturesque landscape, it's beautiful! Hopefully I can show you one day. I can't wait to get back to school. I've missed you and James and Peter so much._

_Christmas was quite good here. My mother got time off work and my dad switched about his hours so he only had to work later at night, so he even got to stay for Christmas dinner! Thank you so much for the chocolate! It was perfect! How did you know that extra-dark was my favourite? I don't know how you could stand sitting next to Bellatrix after what she and her friends did to you a while ago. I don't usually wish such things upon people, but I hope she got food poisoning that day! Don't tell her I said that though, I would quite like it if my limbs stayed attached to my body._

_It's hardly a bad thing that you have done your homework, Sirius. Honestly, you and James seem to think that doing what you are told is a punishable offence!_

_Did you get a new owl? I've not seen this one before, and it doesn't look like one of the ones used in the ordinary postal service. If it is yours, I assume somebody from your family got it for you, since it seems only fitting that a member of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black should have a jet-black owl. Or am I just over thinking things?_

_Remus._

Dear Remus,

Are you saying that you actually miss being rudely awoken in the mornings?! Well then, I shall be sure to oblige as soon as I can and have you up at all hours of the morning.

I don't like that you are alone all of the time, Remmy! It's not fair. I know you have your Muggle town to escape to, but still, I just don't like the thought of you sitting by yourself all holidays. I repeat; it's not fair.

I'm glad you weren't alone on Christmas, nonetheless. I would have had to have done something about it if I found out that that was the case!

I actually have a proposition for you! Every year my parents hold a New Year's Eve party and you, along with Peter and Sirius, are invited! I've written to them both already but for whatever reason Pete STILL hasn't replied to any of my letters and Sirius is up for going, it just depends on whether or not his parents will let him, so I'm not sure whether to be hopeful or not. It would be really great if you could all come! And my mother has suggested that [assuming it is alright with your parents] you can just stay here and go to Diagon Alley with us and then we'll all go back to school together. We'll hopefully be reunited soon, Remmy!

I really hope you can come. I think you'll like my house, Remus. It has a lot of books in it.

James.

**Dear Remus,**

**I am going to go insane if I don't get out of this house soon enough! We already have a house elf, why the hell does she insist on treating me like one?! It's times like this when I miss you and James and Pete all that much more. I will hopefully get to go to James' for New Year's though. If 'I behave and do exactly what I'm told' the hag will let me go. It's like a form of torture, to just accept all of the crap they throw at me without being able to do or say anything about it but it will be worth it to see you guys again. That's if you are allowed to go? I really hope so, I'm with James on this one Remus, I don't like that you're alone all the time. I can't wait to see you again, it's been too long since I've had someone to annoy!**

**Yes, I did get a new owl. My Uncle Alphard got me it, since he's the only person in my family who does not apparently hate me to my very core. I think it's coincidental that the owl is black but you never know, it could be a little subtlety that will make my parents let me keep him. Or you could, of course, just be over thinking things. He's called Gryff, a fact that my parents are oblivious to so far. I'm seeing how long it takes them to figure it out the blatantly obvious meaning behind the name. If they are as smart as they are kind then I don't think I have anything to worry about.**

**If I can keep up this perfectly respectable Slytherin pure blood family act then I'll hopefully see you at James'!**

**Sirius**

_Dear James,_

_From what I hear, Sirius is actually managing to hold his tongue at home so hopefully he will be able to come to yours at New Years. My mother is allowing me to go but she told me to ask my father first but I don't see him having a problem with me going. He's never at home anyway; it's not as if he would notice my absence. Mother also told me to thank your parents for offering to keep me until we return to Hogwarts. She said that I am allowed to stay but, again, I have to ask father first but my previous statement stands so I can't see him having a problem with it._

_Also, I'm sure your house is lovely no matter how many books it has! Although, it is a bonus!_

_Peter has not yet replied to any of my letters either. I am beginning to worry. Surely if he had something planned that was so big and important and would keep him so busy he would have told us before we left Hogwarts? But, on the other hand, I'm sure if something had happened to him we would have found out about it either through the Daily Prophet or someone else getting in touch with us or something. Either way, I'm sure he is alright, I just wish that he would write just to confirm it. It's strange not hearing from him. I don't like it._

_I'll get back in touch when my father has decided to grace my house with his presence and I can ask him about the party, but until then just put me down as going anyway. He doesn't really have any right to say no._

_Hopefully see you and Sirius and Peter soon!_

_Remus._

_**Dear James, Sirius and Remus,**_

_**I'm sorry I haven't kept in touch. I've been very busy. I can't really talk much right now. I just wanted to say thanks but I won't be able to go to the New Year's party but I hope you all have fun. Everything is alright, don't worry, I've just got a lot of things to do.**_

_**I'll see you all when we go back to school.**_

_**Peter.**_


	17. Reunited

**Chapter 17: Reunited**

James was so excited. Remus had written again to confirm that he could come to the party and, surprisingly, Sirius had done the same a few days later. James doubted that Sirius' parents were aware that the house their son would be staying at was the Potter residence but he also doubted that Sirius cared. James was glad that he could get Sirius out of his house and away from his dreadful family. From what Sirius had told him in his letters, they were treating him really badly and James hated it. He hated sitting at home, his perfect home, and feeling helpless to what his best friend was going through. He hated feeling worthless and a useless friend because he couldn't help. Once or twice he considered taking the Floo down to Sirius's house but he knew that his presence would not be exactly good. And Remus was going to be here in a matter of hours! James couldn't help but think that the time he spent here would be the first time that he actually had company for more than a day at a time since the holidays began. He hated the idea that Remus had been alone. Especially Remus. There is just something about Remus that made James feel like he needed to protect him. Not like Remus couldn't look after himself or anything, just that he always seemed to get the short straw and James didn't know how to help him. But they would both be here soon! He couldn't wait to see them! It had been far too long.

But what was going on with Peter? His letter hadn't exactly explained anything. What could possibly take up so much of his time that he couldn't even find five minutes to reply to the first letters that his friends had sent him? Once or twice James had also considered taking the Floo and dropping in on Pete but realised that he didn't know much about Peter's family and didn't want to get his friend into trouble. He was hoping that the party would be a great get together of the four of them but he supposed that it couldn't be helped.

James walked along the hall, checking in on the bedrooms that his friends would be staying in. He had chosen them as soon as he had gotten the replies that his friends would be attending. Sirius was sleeping in the room opposite James's. It was quite a large room, with a massive wardrobe in the corner of it. The walls were red with the skirting boards painted gold. Charles Potter had painted it in celebration when he heard that his son had been sorted into Gryffindor, just in case James wanted to move into a bigger room. James had considered it, but the room made him smile and he just had to keep it for Sirius, if he ever came to stay over. From his weeks of staying shut up in his miserable room, with his Slytherin mad family, James knew that Sirius would love the bright vibrant reds and gold with the moving lion poster along the wall with the Gryffindor logo painted on the ceiling. Sirius would like having that as the last thing he saw before he went to sleep. Remus's room also had a lot of thought put into it. It was also red but instead of gold, it had blue and purple. It was bright, just like Remus, but it also had a slight Ravenclaw tint to it. James, Sirius and Peter were always teasing Remus that he belonged in Ravenclaw with his incessant reading and cleverness. There was again a large wardrobe in one corner and a mini library in the other, with a door leading into the main library, which was about three times larger than the bedroom. James hoped that Remus and Sirius would like them. He couldn't help but think that the wardrobe gave it a more 'homey' feeling, which he thought they both needed.

'What time did you say Sirius and Remus were coming, James?' Maria Potter asked, glancing up from the book she was reading.

'I'm not sure. I think Sirius was trying to convince Remus to let him meet him at Remus's house and then take the Floo here at the same time but I don't think Remus was having any of it.'

'Well, why don't they just meet at Sirius's house and then come together?' Charles asked.

'Remus is a half-blood, dad. I don't think Mr and Mrs Black would appreciate that,' James sighed.

'Ah yes. I keep forgetting that Sirius is a Black. Remus doesn't take it personally, does he?' Maria asked.

'No, I don't think so. I mean, Sirius's family would automatically hate all of us for being friends with Sirius anyway, and we're all Gryffindors. Sirius isn't like them, though, he doesn't care that Remus isn't pureblood. Actually, I think he likes him even more for it,' James replied, smiling.

At that moment the flames of the Potter's fireplace turned emerald green and Sirius stepped out, bold as brass, standing tall and carrying two trunks along with him. He grinned at James and stood aside as Remus spun into view, coughing from the ash, his shabby clothes hanging off him even more than usual. James made a mental note to keep an eye on how much Remus was eating, but cast it aside as he ran at his friends and hugged them. Sirius wrapped his arms tighter and forced James and Remus into a massive bear hug, pulling James onto his tip toes and lifting Remus, who was much smaller than them both, right off his feet.

'Sirius...please...can't breathe...' Remus gasped, causing Sirius to laugh and let them both go, making Remus fall to the floor, clutching his ribs. James laughed and looked down at his friend, offering his hand to help him up. As Remus was pulled to his feet, James could swear that he saw a little jut in Remus's clothes, as though his torso was wrapped up in bandages again, but chose not to ask in front of his parents.

'How did you both get here? I thought you were going to arrive separately!' James said, unable to wipe the grin off his face.

'Honestly, James, did you really expect Sirius to listen to me?' Remus sighed.

'Well, you couldn't very well turn up at my house. My mother would kill you on the spot!' Sirius gasped, feigning shock and hurt.

'So you met at Remus's house?' James asked.

'Well, sort of. I was just heading to Remus's house just as he was heading here and we kind of met in the middle of the Floo ride. Naturally, he was quite surprised to see me, and didn't quite find the words 'James's house' and we ended up in some weird abandoned looking place, so we just came here after that.' Sirius grinned, looking incredibly proud of himself.

'Are those your cases?' James asked, pointing at the trunks that Sirius had set down at his feet.

'Yup. Since Remus didn't have any Floo experience, I thought I would be even more of a lovely, charming person than I already am and take his for him.'

Laughing, James called out 'Veccy!' and a small creature with large bat-like ears and eyes the size of tennis balls arrived with a small pop.

'Yes, Master James?' she asked, bowing low.

'Could you take these two cases upstairs, please?'

'Of course, sir!' Veccy replied happily, grabbing hold of the two trunks and disappearing again with another pop.

'James! When are you going to introduce me?' Charles piped up, suddenly standing beside his son, grinning at the other two boys.

'Oh yeah, this is Sirius and this is Remus. This is my dad and that's my mum,' James said, gesturing to each person in turn.

'Nice to meet you, Mr Potter,' Remus smiled, shaking James's father's hand whilst Sirius just walked right over and hugged James's mother.

'Just call me Charles. And that's Maria,' Charles winked.

'You boys go and have fun. We have to get the house ready for tonight,' Maria smiled. She was proud of her son. He had chosen some lovely friends.

As expected, Sirius and Remus loved their rooms. The second he opened the door, Sirius was frozen to the spot. James and Remus could swear they saw a tear come to his eye, but he turned around and gave James another rib crushing hug and sprung onto his bed, gazing up at the ceiling, constantly commenting on how this was 'definitely his room and he might as well just move permanently right now'. Remus was also frozen to the spot. Sirius guffawed at the Ravenclaw joke behind it but Remus stared, speechless, at the mountain of books that he had access to. He, too, turned to hug James and then promptly ran over to investigate the titles filling up the bookshelf. It took a while to drag him away from them but now the three of them were lounging on Sirius's bed since he refused to be parted from it.

'Don't take this the wrong way, Remmy, but you look awful,' Sirius said, still staring up at the Gryffindor logo on the ceiling.

'Have you been eating properly?' James asked, looking at his friend properly for the first time since they left Hogwarts. Remus looked almost skeletal. He had always been thin, but now he was scary thin. He had huge bags under his eyes and his skin looked slightly grey. He had long sleeves on, but every so often James thought that he caught a glimpse of a bandage on his friend's wrist. Why is it that Remus was always covered in bandages?

'Not really,' Remus admitted. 'With my parents being gone all of the time, I sometimes just forgot to eat.'

'For God's sake, Remus!' Sirius sighed angrily.

'It wasn't intentional!' Remus sighed. 'I just had to adjust to living alone.'

'So are you going to tell us what happened to your wrist then?' James asked, reaching over and pulling up Remus's sleeve to show the bandage wrapping up his friend.

'Blimey, Remus, what have you done this time?' Sirius wondered aloud, propping himself up onto his elbow to examine the thin boys arm.

'It doesn't matter,' Remus muttered, pulling his arm away. It had been the full moon two weeks ago. He was healed now, it was just this bandage for three more days and the one for his ribs for another two and he would be back to normal, but of course his friends couldn't know that.

'Of course it matters! What happened?' Sirius demanded.

'I...I fainted,' Remus mumbled, which was, in fact, true.

'You can't break your wrist by fainting,' Sirius sighed.

'Well, remember he did do it that one time at Hogwarts?' James recalled. 'But it can't have just been that, mate.'

'It's not broken, it's sprained,' Remus defended himself.

'Yes, but what else happened?' Sirius persisted.

'I fainted and...and fell down the stairs.'

'Bloody hell Remus. What did your mum say?' James asked.

'She doesn't know.'

'She wasn't there?'

'No, I just woke up at the bottom of the stairs and tried to just deal with it but it was quite swollen so I told her that I was putting a book back and it fell on my wrist. It's alright now though,' Remus explained.

'Do you understand why we didn't want you to be alone now Remus? You clearly can't handle yourself,' Sirius sighed in exasperation, winking at his friend.

'Enough about me,' Remus said. 'What about you?'

'Me? Not much to tell, really. I've been locked up in my room the whole time, haven't I?' Sirius answered. 'It was incredibly boring. It's not that fun sitting alone for two weeks, but at least your letters kept me sane.'

'It did make things a lot better to know that I was coming here,' Remus smiled shyly.

'Yeah, same here,' Sirius grinned.

'I'm glad I could be of service!' James laughed.

The three friends continued talking all through the day, until the sun of New Year's Eve sunk down behind the mountains and James grinned at his two friends. Party time!


	18. Party Time

**CHAPTER 18: Party Time**

Sirius had never felt more at home in a place that wasn't Hogwarts. He had never truly realised how awful his home situation was until he had something else to compare it with and, looking at the way James got on with his parents, the way lots of people were having fun at one of their parties, the way that everyone was welcome here, Sirius realised how terrible his family really were. He had always known that what he had was not normal but he had never properly appreciated just how badly he was treated until now. A burning hatred filled up inside him. He never wanted to go back. Here, among the banners and music and people having fun, this was where he belonged. There was no prejudice here and he loved it.

Remus didn't really know what to do with himself. He couldn't remember the last time he was at a party and he had certainly never been to a party like this. Ever since he first got bitten, he hadn't had any friends up until he met James and Sirius and Peter. Perhaps he had been to birthday parties with the friends he had as a toddler but he couldn't remember much before life as a werewolf. He didn't really know how to behave. In a way he resented his sheltered upbringing but he understood the necessity of it. He wished, not for the first time, that he was normal and that this would all be easy, but he wasn't and it was hard for him. It was unsettling for him to be in a room so full of people who didn't know him. He was terrified of meeting new people because of how he was and he had to keep reminding himself to breathe and not panic. Despite all of this, he was having a really good time. He realised that as long as he was with his friends, nothing else mattered.

James bounded around the house, dragging his friends along with him. It was so exciting, being here with them. He loved parties, but had always found the ones that his parents threw tedious because there was nobody for him to talk to. It was always his parents' friends, not his own. This time was different and he was having the best time.

'James, James, hold on,' Sirius called from a metre or so behind, 'where are we going?'

'Just come on!' James yelled, charging on faster through the swarm of people and out of the door into his large garden. He continued on, down towards a small wall which separated the Potter residence from a dense forest. Just before he reached the wall, James turned and headed towards a large tree in full bloom despite the snow still littering the ground and began to rapidly climb it.

'Are you being serious, James?' Remus called from the ground.

'Of course he's not, I'm the only one who can be Sirius,' Sirius laughed, leaping onto the tree and following his friend up into the leaves. Remus sighed and gingerly followed them up the tree. He loved climbing trees, but it was dark and he couldn't see where he was going. Eventually he felt two pairs of hands grab him and pull him through the leaves.

'Welcome, Remus!' James grinned, gesturing to the massive tree house that he had just been led too.

It was bigger than the largest room in Remus's house. There was a massive bed in one corner and a couch in the other with Gryffindor posters littering the wooden walls. Beside the couch was a coffee table laden with food and drinks.

'My parents thought that we could come here for our own little party to get away from all of the adults and their boring conversations,' James smiled. 'I thought you would like this better. I could tell that you weren't used to things like that.'

Remus and Sirius grinned and ran over to the couch.

'This is so cool, James,' Sirius said, helping himself to the pile of food in front of him.

'Wait a minute, I have to go and get something back at the house, I completely forgot,' James said, making his way back down the tree.

Remus and Sirius looked at each other and shrugged. Sirius began to tuck into the food again but Remus stood up and began to walk around the room, gazing at everything in it.

'Is something wrong?' Sirius asked, looking up at his friends face and seeing that Remus looked upset.

'No, not at all. Well, maybe. I'm not sure.'

The small boy sighed and went outside to sit on a branch. Sirius joined him.

'What do you mean? What's going on, Remus?'

'It's just...I don't belong here. I don't belong here with you and James,' Remus replied, gazing out at the lights coming from the Potter mansion.

'Of course you do, what are you talking about?'

'I don't, Sirius. You both deserve someone better than me. I mean, look at this place. James lives in a mansion, Sirius. You live in a mansion. This tree house is bigger than any room that I have back at home. Merlin, it's almost the same size as my entire house! I got such wonderful Christmas presents from the two of you and I couldn't afford to give you anything anywhere near as good. Sometimes I just feel like you're just putting up with me because I don't have anyone else. Because I'm not good enough, I just wish I could be something more for you.'

Remus trailed off into a whisper and blinked the tears away from his eyes. He had always been poor, he was used to it, and it was the only life he knew. He never resented his parents for not earning more or anything but he just couldn't help but feel inadequate. James and Sirius deserved a better friend, someone who wouldn't be nervous in a crowd of people, someone who didn't have to lie to protect his secret, someone who could give them back just as much as they gave him. He hated feeling like he was dragging them down.

Sirius didn't know what to say. He looked at his friend, dumbstruck by what he had just heard. It didn't matter to him how much money Remus had, and he knew that it didn't matter to James either. How could Remus possibly think that he, what, that he wasn't good enough for them? It saddened Sirius to know that his friend was thinking like that.

'It doesn't matter, Remus,' he whispered.

'It does,' Remus replied in a low voice, hiding his face from Sirius because he couldn't hold back the tears anymore.

Sirius put his arm around his friend and pulled him close into his chest. He could feel Remus's bones through his clothes and he almost succumbed to tears as well. How could Remus not see how much they cared about him?

'Remus, you have no idea how much you mean to us, ok? You have no idea. What would we do without you? There is no one in this world who could ever take your place to us. It doesn't matter to me how much money you have, and I know it doesn't matter to James either. Every time I see you hurt, or when I first saw you today and you were so thin and looked so ill, it scared me because I couldn't help but think about what would happen if I lost you. I couldn't deal with that, mate. I just couldn't. Things just wouldn't be the same without you as you. We don't want someone with lots of money, or a big house, or whatever, we want you. Do you understand?'

He felt Remus's head nod and he took his arm away from his friend's shoulder. He stood up and pulled Remus to his feet, reaching out and wiping the tears away from his face.

'I don't ever want to hear you talking like that ever again, ok?'

Remus nodded again and hugged Sirius tightly before walking inside and sitting back down on the couch. The two of them began to tuck into the food before James appeared again with a crate full of butterbeer.

'I totally forgot that mum bought these for us and – Remus, having you been crying?'

'Um...hay fever,' Remus improvised, taking a bite of chocolate.

James looked at Sirius who shot him an 'I'll tell you later' look. James nodded and passed around the butterbeers. At that moment bright numbers appeared on the wall, and began to count down from 60.

'My dad wanted to make sure we didn't miss the New Year,' James explained.

The three boys watched the numbers get lower and lower until they finally reached 0.

'HAPPY NEW YEAR!' they chorused, as fireworks exploded overhead.

'So what was wrong with Remus?' James whispered, glancing over to check that the thin boy was definitely asleep. 'Because I'm pretty sure someone doesn't get hay fever in January.'

'He told me that he didn't feel good enough to be our friend because he didn't have a lot of money,' Sirius sighed, shaking his head at the memory.

'What?! That's ridiculous! Was he being serious?'

'Well, since he started crying, I'd assume so, yes.'

'You told him he was being ridiculous, didn't you?'

'Of course I did! It just scared me a bit, you know? It made me think about what life would be like without him. What we would be like without him, and I didn't like it. I really didn't like it, James. Sometimes I feel like we're losing him to some place where we can't get him back because it's somewhere that we can't reach him. We're losing him to his own stupid thoughts.'

'We're not losing him, Sirius. You know as well as I do that we will never let that happen. You, me, Remus and Pete until the end. That's how it's always going to be, yeah?'

Sirius looked up and smiled at James. They stood up and walked over to the couch where Remus had fallen asleep about ten minutes previously. Together they picked him up, trying to ignore how light he was, and lay him down on the bed. Sirius took the couch and James got into a sleeping bag that his father had sent along when it was apparent that the three boys weren't going to come back inside. Silence fell as the two boys stared at the ceiling, waiting for sleep to come, and smiled at the thought of the four friends being together forever.


	19. Peter's Holidays

**CHAPTER 19: Peter's Holidays.**

'Where did Pete say he would meet us?' Sirius asked, dragging his trunk along King's Cross Station.

'He didn't,' James replied, heaving his own trunk behind him. 'He just said that he'll 'see us when we go back to school'.'

'He'll surely be on the train?' Remus suggested, wheeling his trunk along the platform.

'Hopefully,' Sirius answered. 'Since he was far too busy to write to us, we obviously have some catching up to do.'

James and Remus looked at each other with raised eyebrows. Sometimes it was hard to tell if Sirius was actually angry or not, and this was one of those instances.

The three friends all ran at the wall between platforms nine at ten and emerged to see the scarlet train that was the Hogwarts Express awaiting them. They cast a hurried glance around the station to try and see Peter but couldn't see over the heads of the other students returning from the Christmas break. Sirius glanced sideways and winked at James, inclining his head towards Remus. James grinned and grabbed Remus by the arms, who immediately started struggling and protesting.

'James, James, what are you doing? Let me go! James, what's going on?! JAMES!'

A laughing Sirius hoisted the small boy onto his shoulders, dropping both of their trunks to hold on to his ankles.

'Sirius, put me down!' Remus shouted, trying to pull his ankles out of the long haired boy's grip.

'Stop struggling, Remus, you'll fall,' Sirius chortled. 'Just look out for Pete.'

'Oh, honestly, Sirius, this is ridiculous,' Remus muttered, yet looking around all the same. He was really excited to see Peter. It had been great at James's house, with James and Sirius, but it just didn't feel right without Pete. Somehow their friendship didn't feel right without Peter. As much as Remus loved James and Sirius, they were very eccentric and reckless, and much more so than he, and he appreciated that Peter would stay calm with him. Someone had to try and keep James and Sirius alive, and Remus had discovered over the holidays that it was a two person job, and he grew more and more thankful that he had Peter for that every day.

James had missed Peter. For the first few days after Sirius and Remus arrived at his house he couldn't get to sleep because he felt like something was missing. It took him a while before he realised that that something was the other member of their quartet. It seems that you don't really understand or appreciate how important someone truly is until they're suddenly not there. It was nice to see Remus and Sirius, incredible actually, but everything that they did together seemed incomplete because Peter wasn't there. He couldn't wait to see him again.

Sirius had almost forgotten what Peter's voice sounded like and he didn't like that. When he was stuck at Grimmauld Place, locked in his bedroom and he really missed his friends he would have them speak to him, in his head. He would imagine James's voice and the way that he would say things and they would slag off his family and every Slytherin. He would talk about spells and how much he wanted to get away from his house with the Remus voice in his head and he would laugh about Remus's nerdiness with Peter. Not being able to hear his voice anymore was almost as though he had forgotten him and Sirius knew that he would never forget him, not ever.

'Look, look, I think I see him! He's getting on the train!' Remus called from atop his friends shoulders.

Without even bothering to stop and let his friend down, Sirius grabbed his own and Remus's trunks and ran through the crowd, followed by James who had one hand on his own case and one hand held out a few centimetres from Remus's back. It wouldn't serve much purpose if he fell, but it still worked as a reassurance. The three friends raced through the swarm of students and leapt onto the train, getting some very strange looks and a few whispers. They continued to charge down the corridors, looking into compartments trying to find their friend.

'Sirius, I can see him. He's just gone into that compartment!' Remus said, pointing and leaning so far forward that he almost flipped off his friend's shoulder.

'Right you are, Remmy! Onward, James!' Sirius called, racing on forward again.

'PETER!' the three friends yelled.

They ran around the corner and skidded into the compartment with Peter. Sirius, in his excitement, forgot to duck.

'Sirius!' Remus protested from the ground, rubbing the bruise he could feel forming on his head after hitting it off the top of the door and falling off his friend's shoulders.

James, Sirius and Peter all turned to look at him and then burst out laughing simultaneously. Peter held out his hand and pulled Remus to his feet, helping him sit down as his head spun but laughing all the same.

'Well, that's one way to make an entrance!' James roared, flinging himself down on a seat as well. 'So, how have your holidays been Pete?'

'Oh, um, nothing much to tell,' Peter replied, twisting his hands nervously in his lap, an action that was not missed by the rest of his friends.

'Come off it, you've not had time to write all holidays and the one time you do you say that you've been really busy,' Sirius said, confused.

'Is everything okay, Peter?' Remus asked, looking sideways at his friend who very slowly shook his head.

'What happened?' James asked, all traces of laughter gone.

'I'd rather not talk about it. At least not on the train,' Peter mumbled.

James, Sirius and Remus looked at each other briefly with concerned looks before turning away and waiting for the train to arrive back at Hogwarts.

The day passed annoyingly slowly. Peter acted completely normal, as if nothing had changed but James, Sirius and Remus couldn't help but look out for subtle hints about what had happened in Peter's life. Even though Peter had only said that he didn't want to talk about it on the train, the three of them had mutually agreed to wait until they were in their dormitory that night.

'So, are you going to tell us what happened now, Pete?' Sirius asked lightly, lying on his bed with his head hanging off the edge.

'Well, do you remember the guy who came to pick me up at King's Cross at the end of term?' Peter said hesitantly.

'Yes...' James replied, wondering where this was going.

'That wasn't my dad, it was my big cousin. I asked him what was going on, but he just told me that he would explain later.'

Now that he had begun, Peter began talking faster, as though he had been storing all of this up for ages because he didn't want to talk about it but now that he had started too, he realised how much he wanted to tell his friends.

'By the time we got home, it was pretty late, so I just went to bed. I woke up in the morning and he sat me down in his living room. He...he told me that my dad had left my mum and we had to move. He told me that my mum hadn't wanted dad to leave and she cried and begged him to stay but...but he wouldn't stay and she wouldn't get out of his way and he just...he just snapped. He hit her and then he used that 'Petrificus Totalus' spell on her. My cousin hadn't heard from her for a while so he went around to see what was going on and he found her. She hadn't been able to move for three days so she was in a right state and I wasn't allowed to see her for a few days until she got sorted out. I don't know, since then she's...she's changed. I think...I think it sent her over the edge a little bit. She's my mother, I love her, I don't want to call her crazy, but...but I think what he did to her...it really destroyed her. I'm sorry, I wish I could have come to your house, James, but I just...she needed me. I couldn't leave her too.'

Peter hadn't noticed when he had started crying but now he felt the tears running down his face and he didn't even bother to wipe them away. He didn't care that his friends saw, they were past that point. He was just so relieved that he had finally told someone, that he wasn't alone in this anymore. Since his dad left, he never came back. He never came to see his son; he never tried to get in contact. Peter tried to write to him, but received no reply. He spent a large majority of the holidays coming to terms with the fact that he had lost his father. It was strange because nothing had really changed. His father hadn't died, there was no need to grieve, but he had left. It confused Peter because he didn't feel as sad as he thought he would. But it wasn't really any different from the way things had been anyway. His dad was never usually home, he was always working, sometimes not even working in this country, so as far as the father/son relationship went, it was pretty much exactly the same. But his mother had changed. He had to come to terms with that. She had been ruined by his own father, her own husband. She flinched every time she turned a corner, every small sound was threatening, and her mind had been caught in a web of paranoia. She wasn't the person that he left on the platform the first time he ever rode to Hogwarts, and he didn't know if she ever would be again. And that was a hard fact to come to terms with.

James, Sirius and Remus were dumbstruck. They didn't know what they had been expecting, but it certainly hadn't been that. As one they stood up and walked over to Peter and hugged him, they couldn't think of anything else to do. What could they do? They wished that they could somehow fix it, but there was no way for them to do it, it would be foolish to even try or to even mention it.

'Some Christmas,' Sirius whispered, hearing Peter's watery chuckle from somewhere in the tangle of arms.

'Well, it's not all bad, Pete. At least you don't look like Remus,' James teased, reaching forward to poke the large bruise on Remus's head from earlier on in the train.

Remus flinched away and grabbed a pillow which he threw at James and before they knew it, the four friends had launched themselves into a huge pillow fight. It felt right, to be back in their dormitory, doing something stupid, the four of them together again, just having fun. They couldn't help but think that it didn't matter how bad the situation was, the four best friends would somehow find a way to make each other smile again.


	20. Snow

_[A/N] This probably seems like the most random chapter ever but it ties in with the next chapter so just bear with me._

**CHAPTER 20: Snow**

'WAKE UP! WAKE UP! IT'S SNOWING AGAIN!'

Sirius Black charged around the Gryffindor dormitory, waking up his three best friends.

'Sirius, it's January, it's not uncommon for it to snow,' Remus yawned groggily, not entirely sure what was going on. His thoughts took a while to make sense in the mornings.

'But it's really snowing. It's, blimey, it's like a blizzard!' Sirius grinned.

Sirius loved snow. When he was younger he used to build snowmen with his brother. Regulus would always run inside to get his father to admire their 'snow wizards'. Sirius used to be confused at this and one year said 'But mine's not a snow wizard. It's just an ordinary snow man'. His father struck him and since then he was never allowed to play out in the snow again in case he continued making 'filthy Muggles' out of snow. But he was at Hogwarts now. His father wasn't here to stop him.

'Let's go outside!' he beamed.

'What, now?' Peter asked, furrowing his brow in confusion.

'Of course not, it's the middle of the night,' James laughed, but then stopped at the sight of his best friend pulling on shoes. 'Sirius, you can't be serious.'

'Well, why not?' Sirius winked. He was already dressed. Fortunately this was one of the nights that he slept in a T-shirt and loose trousers and didn't have to bother getting changed. 'Right, who's coming?'

The three other boys heaved themselves into sitting positions in their beds and started at their friend incredulously.

'Sirius, it's around two in the morning,' James said.

'It's snowing, so it will be absolutely freezing,' Peter added.

'You'll catch your death of cold,' Remus concluded.

'No I won't, it'll be fine, let's go,' Sirius grinned, bouncing up on to his feet.

'Sirius, my mother is a Healer, if you go outside in the freezing cold it weakens your immune system,' James stated.

'Is your immune system the one that fights off germs and stuff?' Peter whispered to Remus.

'Yes,' the small boy replied. 'And Sirius, James is right. You could get really ill.'

'So I take it you're not coming?' Sirius asked. The three boys shook their heads. 'Fine, I'll go alone.'

And just like that, the tall boy bounded out of the room excitedly.

'If he gets caught he's going to get into so much trouble for being out after hours,' Peter sighed.

'We should probably go after him, but then we might get caught and we'd all get into more trouble. He wouldn't thank us for dragging him away from the precious snow either,' James said, trying to figure out what to do.

'He's going to regret this,' Remus yawned. 'What do you want to do then? Go look for him, stay up and wait for him, or just sleep and hope he'll be back in the morning?'

'Look, I see him!'

Peter had gotten out of bed and walked to the window, out of which he was currently squinting at Sirius attempting to throw snowballs at their window and enchanting them when he realised that he couldn't throw them high enough. James and Remus scrambled out of bed and also stood by the window, gawping at their friend.

'He wasn't joking,' James said incredulously.

'Okay, no,' Remus sighed, picking up a spare bit of parchment and a quill.

_Sirius, that's enough. Please come back up to the dormitory. We'll go out in the snow in the morning, ok? It's after hours; you'll get in lots of trouble if you're caught. Gryffindor might lose house points and I know you don't want that so please just come back up here._

_Remus._

Remus whispered a spell and the parchment flew down to Sirius, who was now making snow angels. The three friends watched as he read the note and sighed. Slowly, he turned and began to trudge back towards the entrance to the castle.

'There. That's that,' Remus said, slipping back into bed.

James and Peter shrugged and went back to their beds as well, waiting for Sirius to return.

Fifteen minutes had passed before Sirius walked into the dormitory. He was soaked from the melted snow and his lips had begun to turn blue but he was still smiling.

'Sorry,' he said. 'I got a bit overexcited.'

'Clearly,' James laughed, ruffling his friend's hair to help him get rid of the remaining snow.

'What were you thinking?' Peter asked, staring at the water dripping from Sirius's fingertips.

The muscular boy told them the story about his father banning him from the snow because he never gave his snow men wands because he didn't want them to be wizards. By the end of it he was shivering and his lips had gone completely blue.

'Sirius, get into bed and warm up before you get hypothermia,' Remus instructed, pulling out an old thick jumper from his own trunk and throwing it at his friend.

'Remmy, do you really expect this to fit me? You're a dwarf,' Sirius replied, laughing even though his teeth were chattering.

'It's too big for me, it should be fine,' Remus said, glaring at the taller boy until he had gotten into bed and fallen straight to sleep.

James, Peter and Remus looked at each other, shrugged, and went back to sleep themselves.

Remus was the first to wake up the next morning, which was strange. He was always the one to be awoken [rudely] by the others, but he felt wide awake and so wasn't about to go back to sleep. It was still quite early, too early to really bother getting dressed, but he had nothing else to do, so he found his clothes and headed into the bathroom. Remus always changed privately to hide the uncountable scars crisscrossing his body from the years of transformations. It would be his transformation the next night and he was now trying to think of what excuse he could use this time. He sighed. He was sick of the excuses, sick of lying. Of course, no one could ever find out that he was a werewolf, but he just hated having to pretend all of the time. The cycle would start tomorrow and he despised knowing how ill he was going to feel throughout the day without ever letting on that there was anything out of the ordinary. Stupid lycanthropy.

Once he was dressed, he left the bathroom and the dormitory, heading down to Gryffindor Common Room which was completely empty. Remus headed over to read the notices, just to pass the time. Apparently the Wizard's Chess Club was back on next week, Quidditch practices were starting up again in two days time, Madam Pomfrey had brewed more Pepper-Up Potion and everyone with colds were urged to go to her to be cured and prevent it from being passed on and the next Hogsmeade trip date was posted for all those third year and above. Not as interesting as Remus had hoped. He sat down in his favourite seat by the fire and picked up a book that was lying on the table and began to read it, getting so lost in the words that he forgot to keep track of time.

'Blimey Remus, there you are!' James's voice said, pulling the book away from Remus. 'We woke up and couldn't find you!'

'Sorry, I woke up early and didn't want to wake you all,' Remus replied, smiling innocently at his messy haired friend.

'PETE! SIRIUS! FOUND HIM!' James yelled.

Footsteps thundered down the stairs into the Common Room and Remus's bag is thrown onto his lap by Sirius.

'Come on. Breakfast,' he grinned.

Transfiguration wasn't the same as it used to be. Professor McGonagall had gotten sick of the four boys messing around and had separated them, however their protests were even more unbearable than before so she compromised by having James and Peter at one table and Remus and Sirius at another, on opposite ends of the room from each other. It didn't completely silence them, but from the looks of it nothing ever will. She had decided to never ever put Sirius and James next to each other and hoped that Remus and Peter would have a calming effect on each of them. It seemed to be working a little.

Remus was taking notes as always. He took notes in class, and the others copied them up later. That way they would learn and not have to pay attention.

'It's really hot in here, isn't it?' Sirius said, his head in his hands with his elbows on the table.

Remus looked at him sideways, wondering if he was being sarcastic since Remus found it quite cold.

'Erm, is it?' Remus asked, still trying to work out if it was a joke.

'I don't know, it wasn't and then it just suddenly was,' Sirius replied, his head still in his hands. At that moment he shivered.

'It can't be hot if you're shivering,' Remus said, still watching his friend.

'I don't know, it's just really hot,' Sirius whispered.

'Take your head out of your hands and you might cool down a bit, because it's actually quite cold,' Remus suggested. Sirius slowly shook his head so Remus reached forward and gently pushed his friends hands down and held his head up. As soon as he touched his forehead, heat flooded into his hand and Sirius groaned and started coughing.

'Sirius, are you feeling alright?' Remus asked, as another chill ran down his friend's spine.

'No.' Sirius replied.

'What's wrong?'

'My head hurts. And so do my arms. And my neck. And most of me. And I just want to sleep,' Sirius whispered, shivering again.

'You've got a fever as well. Okay, mate, I'll get you to the hospital wing,' Remus said softly, raising his hand.

'What is it, Mr Lupin?' McGonagall sighed, looking up from the pile of paper she was rifling through.

'It's Sirius, Professor, he's ill.'

'Very well then, take him to the Hospital Wing.'

Remus stood up and turned to help Sirius, but his friend rose from his seat and crumpled to the floor, completely passed out.

Sirius woke up after being in the Hospital Wing for about ten minutes. Professor McGonagall had conjured up a stretcher and had allowed Remus, James and Peter to go with it down to the Hospital Wing. Madam Pomfrey had instantly diagnosed their friend.

'The flu?' Sirius repeated quietly, coughing again.

'Yes. You'll have to drink this and stay here for an hour or two. Usual administration of this potion would allow you to just leave but the flu is a lot worse than the common cold, so you'll have to just stay put, I'm afraid,' Madam Pomfrey replied, pouring out a goblet of Pepper-Up Potion.

'Doesn't that make steam come out of your ears?' Peter asked, leaning away from the bubbling goblet as if it were dangerous.

'I don't really care Pete. I just want this to stop,' Sirius wheezed, squeezing his eyes shut at the sound of his own voice.

'I would recommend that you three leave. I can't make you, but the flu is contagious so you may want to consider coming back in a few hours instead of staying,' Madam Pomfrey said whilst handing Sirius the potion, which he downed in one gulp.

'No. Thank you, but if it's alright I'd like to stay,' Remus said, James and Peter nodding their agreement.

Madam Pomfrey consented and bustled back to her office, leaving the four friends to it.

'Hey, Sirius, the steam has stopped,' James grinned, slightly disappointed that he couldn't make fun of it anymore.

'Maybe this will teach you to not go out in the snow in the middle of the night without bothering to put proper clothes on,' Remus said, secretly enjoying that he got to say 'I told you so.' 'The cold weakened your immune system and made you ill, just like we said.'

'Shut it, Remus,' Sirius grumbled, annoyed at his friends triumphant smirk.

'Do you feel better?' Peter asked.

'I feel just dandy, Pete!' Sirius replied happily, bouncing out of his bed. 'HEY MADAM POMFREY! CAN I GO NOW?'

'Yes, yes just go!' she replied. They had been making enough noise to last her a lifetime.

Sirius grinned and walked out as cockily as he possibly could. He was glad to be out of there and free to do whatever he wanted. Just as he turned the corner to head towards the Great Hall for dinner he found himself face to face with his cousin Bellatrix who smirked at him evilly and mimed fainting. How the hell had she found out? No matter how hard he tried, he just couldn't seem to escape from his family. He hated them even more than he could possibly put into words. But he smiled at his friends like nothing was wrong and they took their usual seats at the Gryffindor table.


	21. The Worst Transformation

**Chapter 21: The Worst Transformation**

Remus swirled water around his mouth, before spitting it out into the sink, unsuccessful in his attempt to remove the taste of vomit from his mouth. James, Sirius and Peter were all still asleep, completely unaware that their friend had been woken up by the nightmare of when he was first attacked by a werewolf once again. Every month his dreams reminded him of the night he became a monster and his life changed forever. He had pulled a pillow over his face before he fell asleep to muffle his screams and pulled over the curtains so that his friends would not notice him thrashing about in his bed as his mind was tormented by his worst memory. He was used to it now, waking up, running to the bathroom before he was sick and composing himself in time to act normal around his friends, completely hiding how terrible he felt on the day of the full moon. He shakily slid down to sit on the floor, his skin pale, his eyes closed. He was so tired but too afraid to go back to sleep.

'It's weird though, isn't it?' Sirius said. 'We're almost finished a whole year here. It's weird.'

'Yes, but what if we don't pass the end of year exams? Will they not let us back?' Peter worried, flicking through the notes that he had copied off Remus.

'Nah, it's only the OWLs and NEWTs that are actually important. End of year exams just show how you're getting on,' James replied lazily.

The four friends were lounging about underneath a tree overlooking the Black Lake. Three were conversing whilst Remus was reading, occasionally looking up to glance over at the astonishing view of the reflected sun along the lake and the mountains on the horizon. He couldn't really concentrate on the words, he was hot with a fever, his head was pounding and his eyesight had blurred but he didn't want to join in the conversation in case he threw up when he opened his mouth. He hated lycanthropy.

'What do you think, Remus?'

'Hmm?'

'I thought you had zoned out,' James laughed. 'We were just talking about doing a prank on the last day of school?'

'Oh, yeah, definitely,' Remus replied, his head getting lighter and more painful by the minute. He raised his eyes to look at the sun, and how it was sinking lower and lower behind the mountains. The moon would be up soon. The full moon. His heart began to beat in irregular patterns as he began to panic.

'Keep calm. Keep calm. Keep calm. Keep calm. Keep calm,' he thought to himself, as his breathing became erratic.

James, Sirius and Peter had begun excitedly discussing prank ideas so Remus lifted up his book again and hid behind it, until he had calmed down. The sun was sinking lower. The moon was getting closer. He was feeling so ill. The moon would be up soon. He was feeling worse by the minute. The sun was sinking lower. He had to come up with an excuse. The moon would be up soon. He hadn't planned an excuse for today. He had forgotten. How could he forget? If only Sirius hadn't been ill yesterday, he might have come up with something. How could he be stupid enough to forget, he –

'Remus, come here, have you ever seen this spell before?'

Cautiously, the small boy heaved himself onto his knees and crawled over to his friends, surprised that his limbs still worked. He took his place in the circle and looked at the books with the fever getting to be too much until he had to take off his jumper and sit in his shirt.

'Remus, aren't you cold? It's freezing!' Peter gasped, pulling his robes tighter around himself.

'No it's not! It's really warm!' Remus replied, still looking at the books, and feeling a shiver run down his spine.

'Right you, up!' Sirius said, grabbing his friend by the arms and pulling him to his feet.

'Sirius, don't!'

'No, not 'Sirius, don't!' It's cold out here, Remus. You're warm. You're going to the Hospital Wing. After yesterday, do you really think I'm going to take any chances with my friends?' Sirius growled, tightening his grip around the boy's chest.

'Blimey, Remus, you're really burning up!' James said, standing up to support the smallest boy as his legs began to buckle.

'Remus! Remus, don't faint, look at me, and don't faint. It'll be ok; you'll be fine, yeah?' Peter called, holding onto his friends face.

'Yeah, I'll be fine. I've got you guys.'

Then he gave in and allowed the world to go black as he crumpled to the ground.

Blood. The wolf smelt blood. It was on the ground. How was it supposed to eat if the blood was on the floor? Outside. There would be food outside this room. The wolf threw itself repeatedly against the door but it wouldn't budge. It scratched at the walls, and tried to dig through the floorboards, eventually resorting to scratching itself in frustration. It didn't like being here, stuck here, trapped. It was sick of being alone, sick of being hidden. Anger rising, it ripped chunks out of itself and flung its body around the room, yelping at the sound of a bone snapping. Each time it got hurt, the wolf became angrier, ripping and tearing more and more all through the night.

'Guys, don't you think it's strange how often Remus gets ill or has to leave because someone in his family is ill?' James asked, flopping down on the couch in the empty Gryffindor Common Room.

'Thank you! Someone agrees with me! I thought I was just over thinking things,' Sirius replied. 'I mean, I can understand this one since it's kind of my fault...but over the holidays I couldn't help but think about it. He left a few times because he said that his mother was deathly ill but he said in his letters that he was always home alone because she was constantly working. Someone who was that ill couldn't just suddenly jump up and be alright again and hop off to work. Or at least, not work as much as she does.'

'It's not your fault he's ill, Sirius,' Peter reassured his friend. 'But I have to admit that I've been getting suspicious as well. It seemed to be a bit...frequent. I mean, have you noticed that it's always very...timed?'

'Timed?' Sirius asked.

'He always leaves every month. Every single month. He left in October, then again in November, then in December –'

'Yeah, we get it, Pete,' James interrupted. 'I've never noticed that. Every month? There's something that he's not telling us.'

'I don't think he will tell us. If he's been keeping it a secret from us, he's not going to just open up to us because we ask,' Sirius said.

'We could try and find out,' Peter suggested.

'You know, Pete, I think that's the best idea you've ever had,' James agreed, pulling out a bit of parchment and a quill. 'Right. What do we know?'

'He's gone every month.'

'He always comes up with an excuse.'

'He's always ill the day that he leaves.'

'Yeah, and he looks like a right mess when he gets back. As if he hasn't slept in days.'

'He's always covered in bandages.'

'He doesn't eat.'

'He doesn't eat?'

'Haven't you noticed? In the Great Hall he just cuts everything up really small and pushes it around his plate so it looks like he's eaten it but he hasn't.'

'Oh, I'm going to kill him!'

'Sirius, focus!'

'Right, sorry James, um, he's always gone for a few days after he leaves.'

'Ok, I think that's enough to go by for now,' James concluded, putting down the quill. 'I think we should keep this a secret. Remus will be furious if he finds out that we're going being his back.'

'Agreed.'

'Agreed.'

The sun slowly began to rise back over the horizon and the wolf howled and its bones began to crunch, break and grind themselves into smaller bones. The howls turned into screams and the claws disappeared into new skin and turned into blood encrusted fingernails. After the agony was over the small body of a boy was lying crumpled on the ground in an ever expanding pool of blood. Remus was scared. He hadn't ever felt pain like this. It was excruciating to simply take a breath and he felt strength leave his body as the blood continued to seep out of his veins and the world went black once more.

Remus's eyes slowly and groggily opened. He was in an abnormally clean white room that he had never seen before. He couldn't move. His arms and legs were tied down to the bed. He panicked and tried to pull away but felt unbearable pain ripping through his entire body. Eyes darting around this strange room, he tried to scream but his voice wouldn't work. Fear rising, he twisted around in the covers frantically until he heard a strange noise and felt a drug working its way into his bloodstream. Heart thudding in terror, he felt his eyelids droop and he fell into unconsciousness once more.

'Madam Pomfrey! We're back!'

James, Sirius and Peter strolled into the Hospital Wing. They had been ordered to stay away after they carried Remus there, but assumed that he would be better by now like Sirius was so had come back.

'Back? Back for what?' Madam Pomfrey asked, surreptitiously stepping in front of the boys so that they couldn't see that their friend was missing.

'To get Remus,' James replied with a grin, trying to step around her and failing.

'I'm sorry boys, he's not well enough yet,' the matron replied, unaware that Sirius had snuck behind her into the ward of beds and found them all empty.

'He's not here,' Sirius said to James and Peter. 'Why isn't he here?'

'Now, really boys, I think you should be going now-'

'Where is he? Remus! REMUS! REMMY! WHERE ARE YOU? STOP HIDING!' Sirius yelled, soon joined by Peter and James.

'Now boys, really!'

The three friends stopped abruptly at the stern voice of Professor McGonagall.

'I think you had better leave now,' Madam Pomfrey ushered, putting her hand on Sirius's shoulder and trying to push him away but he refused to leave and stood him ground.

'I'm not leaving. Not until I find out what's going on with Remus!' Sirius said, sitting cross legged on the floor.

'Me neither,' Peter agreed, copying the action.

'We'll stay here all night if we have to,' James added, sitting on the floor with his friends.

Professor McGonagall looked as if she was about to take House Points away from the boys but her face softened and she actually smiled at them. James was shocked. He didn't know she knew how to smile.

'I'm sure Mr Lupin would be touched by your loyalty,' she smiled down at them.

'Well, I'm sure he would as well but he's not here to see it. So where is he?' Sirius demanded.

'Yeah, we took him in here yesterday after he passed out. Madam Pomfrey said he had caught the flu off Sirius and we had to leave him alone while he rested. But Sirius was fine after a few hours. Remus has had all night, where is he?' Peter said, staring defiantly at the two witches standing above him.

'Mr Lupin is very ill,' Professor McGonagall began. It was terrible. As head of Gryffindor house, she was called down, along with Professor Dumbledore, to the Shrieking Shack to see the mangled body of what was barely recognisable as little Remus Lupin. There was no other option, he was sent to St Mungo's and an alibi was improvised early this morning to avoid suspicion.

'It was not the flu as we had first thought, but a virus,' she continued. 'I agreed this morning that the best thing for him was to be sent to St Mungo's-'

'WHAT?!' James shouted, jumping to his feet.

'When were we going to be told?!' Peter demanded.

'I want to see him RIGHT NOW!' Sirius yelled.

'I'm afraid I can't allow tha-'

'I DON'T CARE! I WANT TO SEE REMUS!' three voices bellowed in unison.

'Ok, but not now. I will allow you to see him when he is ready to have visitors,' Madam Pomfrey said, with a slightly hesitant but agreeing nod from Professor McGonagall.

'But-'

'No 'buts'. That is the only agreement I can come to,' Professor McGonagall interrupted, ending the conversation.

The three Gryffindors consented huffishly and sat in their dormitory that night, casting sad glances at their missing friend's empty bed, constantly wondering what was going on and why Remus was hiding something from them. They had to find out what was going on with him. No more excuses. No more lies. If Remus won't tell them the truth, they'll find it out for themselves.


	22. St Mungo

**Chapter 22: St Mungo's**

How many days had passed without Remus? 3? 4? Without him the days didn't seem to matter. It was as if a huge hole had been punched into the very soul of the group of friends, a hole which could only be filled by the pale, bookish boy. Every day they had been pestering Professor McGonagall about going to see Remus at St Mungo's but she was yet to allow them and simply told them to try and forget about it and not worry. But of course that was ridiculous. Every moment they thought about him, stuck in hospital, ill. Dying? They didn't know. Each class they took turns in taking notes for him and at night they would simply look at his empty bed sadly. But despite their current worries, they couldn't help but think about the secret they knew he was keeping from them, and had decided to go to the library.

'I can't do it, Sirius,' James whispered, standing outside the doors.

'It'll be ... fine. Remus comes here all the time,' Sirius replied, hesitantly, leaning away from the door as if it were poisoned.

'Exactly! The only people who come here are weirdoes like him and Ravenclaws!' James said, cautiously leaning forward to prod the door.

Peter merely sighed and opened the door, grabbing his two friends by the wrist and dragging them in behind him. They had to find out Remus's secret and he knew he couldn't do it alone.

Remus groggily opened his eyes to see the same white room he had been seeing for the brief moments that he was conscious. It had always been empty but apparently today was an exception.

'Oh, you're awake then?'

The boy willed his eyes to focus on the blurry figure standing at the foot of his bed. He recognised her voice, but couldn't quite place it. He tried to squint through the haze of his eyelids and the woman laughed.

'You look like James. He always does that when he doesn't have his glasses on.'

It was then that it hit him. The voice. The reference to his friend. He prayed that he was still unconscious and that this was still a dream. Maria Potter could not know that he was a werewolf.

James and Sirius had only lasted about five minutes in the library before running out screaming and dusting themselves off as if they were somehow dirty. Peter had rolled his eyes and grabbed the books nearest to him before following them back to the dormitory.

'Peter! You stole books?! Madam Pince will not be pleased,' James guffawed, weighing up the hardbacks in his hands.

'The term is 'borrowed', James. It's what you do at a library,' Peter sighed, taking the books back and setting them out on the ground so that each title was visible.

'Blimey, Pete, it's like you're turning into Remus!' Sirius gasped, pointing an accusatory finger at his friend.

'Well, he's the one who holds us all together; someone has to be him, don't they?' Peter snapped, picking up the books nearest to him, and beginning to read.

'I want Remus to be Remus,' James whispered.

'Me too,' Sirius said.

'I do as well, but he's not here right now. But hopefully he won't have to leave again once we figure this out. So get reading,' Peter instructed, throwing two very large and very heavy books at his friends, and smirking as they glared at him after narrowly avoiding a broken nose.

'It's ok, Remus. I've always known,' the Healer smiled.

Now that his vision had cleared, he could see her. The long dark hair, the kind smile, the large brown eyes. Why did it have to be her? Anybody but her.

'You obviously wouldn't remember,' she began, sitting down on the edge of his bed. 'When you were first attacked all those years ago when you were four, your parents brought you in here. It looked like you weren't going to make it. You were in hospital for three weeks. Because of the...nature of the accident, I'm afraid a lot of the Healers backed away, they didn't want to have to deal with a ... well, a lot of people left but I just couldn't let you die. When you came to my house I wasn't even sure if it was definitely you, you have grown up so much since the last time I saw you. And when you were brought in this time, it seemed like you were definitely not going to make it. But James couldn't lose you. I know how much you mean to him, you and the others. And you opened your eyes briefly and whispered their names, and I knew that you were going to be okay.'

'What happened to me?'

'It looks like you slashed open an artery. You also broke your ribs to an extent that one of them actually punctured your lung. Most of your bones were broken, including your spine. It's been a long couple of days but we're out of the danger zone now,' she informed him.

'What's the lie this time?' Remus sighed.

'You had a virus that began to attack your nervous system. Last I heard, they believed it which is a good thing since Professor McGonagall is thinking of letting them visit you soon.'

'Visit?! No, they can't! I mean, I want to see them, but they can't see me in this state!'

'Most of the damage is from your chest down so as long as you stay in bed, which you most definitely will, they shouldn't notice anything.'

'They notice everything. Every single time, they always notice,' Remus muttered, wincing as he moved himself into a more comfortable position.

Maria Potter smiled but inside she was saddened. Did Remus not trust his friends enough to tell them? It isn't good to keep things secret, especially big things like lycanthropy. They would understand, she knew they would. They wouldn't leave him. Her heart felt suddenly heavy when she realised that since that awful night when he was first bitten, Remus probably never let anyone in ever again.

'Would you like me to say that they can't come?' she asked the boy, who looked so small and vulnerable, curled up on the white bed.

'...No. I want to see them. Just as long as they won't notice. They can't notice...' Remus whispered, a thought suddenly coming into his head. 'If you've known for all of this time, why haven't you told James?'

'Well, at first I wasn't sure it was even you. I know that Remus Lupin isn't the most common of names but, forgive me for thinking so, but I didn't think you would have gone to Hogwarts,' she explained, looking into the small boy's eyes and smiling as he nodded his forgiveness at her thinking that. 'But James told me in one of his letters that your mother was ill and you had had to go home to visit her. I noticed that it was the day of the full moon and then I knew that it was you. So why didn't I tell him? That's not my decision to make. It's not my place to tell him. If you don't want him to know, that's up to you, but it's a very big secret to keep, Remus. You don't have to do this alone.'

Mrs Potter stood up and left the room, kissing her sons friend on the cheek as she did so. Remus stared blankly at the ceiling, struggling to process what had just happened.

'Well, about time!' Sirius said, unflinching at the glare of Professor McGonagall.

'So we can go and see him right now?' Peter grinned, practically bouncing on his tiptoes.

'Yes, Madam Pomfrey is waiting in her office with Floo Powder, but Remus was very ill, he might not be very-'

'Thanks, Professor,' James interrupted, storming out of the room with his friends hot on his heels, not stopping until they had reached Madam Pomfrey's tiny office in the Hospital Wing.

'Right, so we can go now, yes?' Sirius smiled excitedly, heading straight for the vacant fireplace.

'He'll be coming back soon then?' Peter asked, heading to the fireplace to join his friend.

'Yes, he should be getting transferred here within this next week, but I think you boys should-'

'Thanks, Madam Pomfrey!' James interrupted once again, grabbing a handful of powder, yelling 'St Mungo's!', and disappearing after his friends in a flash of green flames.

'REMUS!'

He couldn't remember falling asleep but the small boy was jolted awake by a tangle of limbs crashing onto his bed. Hard as he tried, he just couldn't act annoyed even though it was painful to have them on top of him, and instead started laughing until the three boys had crawled off him and sat on the edge of his bed, grinning.

'Hi,' was all Remus could think to say.

'Madam Pomfrey says you'll be back at Hogwarts this week!' Peter squeaked, his grin apparently permanently stuck.

'Yeah, I heard. They've taken me off the medication now so I don't really see why they would keep me here,' Remus replied, grinning in spite of himself. He couldn't help but look forward to going back to Hogwarts with his friends. He really couldn't wait to be with them again.

'So what's it like in here?' Sirius asked, casting a suspicious eye around the room. 'It looks too clean.'

'Well, I was unconscious for the first few days then I spent most of my time reading or talking to the Healers, I didn't really have time to be bothered by the cleanliness of the room,' Remus replied sarcastically, rolling his eyes.

'Are the Healers nice?' James asked, inspecting the pile of books on the bedside table.

'Oh yeah, they're great! Except this one, she's a real battleaxe, Maria Potter I think her name is,' Remus said, smirking.

'My mum's here?!' James gasped, eyebrows raising in disbelief.

'Well, I'd assume so since she works here and I've been talking to her,' Remus grinned. 'And I'm joking, she's very nice.'

'I can't believe she didn't tell me she was with you! I've been sitting here worrying and she's been with you! Ridiculous!' James said.

'You've been worrying?' Remus repeated. Even though it had almost been a year since he's met his friends, sometimes he still found it strange to believe that people actually cared about him.

'Of course he's been worrying! We all have!' Sirius sighed. 'When will you realise that we care about you, mate?'

'It was really scary. You passed out, so we carried you to the Hospital Wing and Madam Pomfrey wouldn't let us stay so we came back in the morning to get you only to be told that you had been carted off here!' Peter said, his hands twisting in his lap.

'I'm sorry,' Remus whispered.

To everyone's surprise, James laughed. 'And you really need to stop apologising all of the time!'

While the three visitors laughed and Remus smiled shyly, the door opened and Maria Potter entered.

'Hi Mrs Potter!' Sirius, Peter and Remus chorused, while James almost back flipped onto the floor to hide.

'Hi, boys! Here to visit, I see,' she smiled. 'Ready to take him off our hands?'

'Seriously? He can go right now?' James asked excitedly, resurfacing from the ground.

'Seriously. You boys just come with me, we'll wait outside while he gets all of his stuff together,' Maria smiled, leading the boys out of the door, allowing Remus to pull his clothes on over his bandages without questions. She soon realised that despite the talk that they had had, Remus was not going to open up to his friends any time soon. She could understand that but wished that the boy could trust his friends as much as they trusted him.

'WE'RE BACK!' the four boys yelled as they individually crashed into the matron's office. They ignored her instructions to be quiet and, after allowing her to give Remus a quick once over, ran from the Hospital Wing back up to their dormitory in Gryffindor Tower. They still hadn't sorted anything out for that prank and they really needed to get started right away. The summer holidays and the end of their first year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry were right around the corner.


	23. The Marauders

**CHAPTER 23: The Marauders**

'WAKE UP GUYS!'

James had long ago developed this habit of screaming at the top of his lungs to bring his friends out of sleep. He had always been an early riser, it seemed physically impossible for him to stay in bed once he had woken up, which he done very early.

'Mate, we don't have any classes today, get lost!' Peter Pettigrew mumbled into his pillow, caught in a state of being half awake and half asleep.

'We're going home today, Pete! I thought you'd like to have a lot of time to pack, and reminisce over everything we've done this year and, oh yeah, PREPARE FOR THE END OF YEAR PRANK TONIGHT?!'

James felt his face form a look of pure shock at the fact that his friends still weren't bothering to get up. It had been over a week since Remus had been released from St Mungo's and they had been planning this prank ever since, right down to the details. Why weren't they excited?

'Well, don't act too excited,' James said sarcastically.

'Yeah, I'm ecstatic. We pull off this fantastic prank tonight and then I get to home to my fantastic family and am locked in my room until September. Yeah, I can't wait,' Sirius groaned, not moving from his bed.

'Yeah, and I'll get to go home and take care of my broken mother and adjust to the idea that my dad is gone and doesn't care anymore,' Peter grumbled, still not fully awake.

'And I'll get to stay at home alone, because my parents don't have time for me. Not even enough time to visit me when I was in St Mungo's,' Remus sighed, pulling his covers up over his shoulders.

'...Your parents didn't visit you?' James repeated, unable to imagine the situation.

'Nope. No letter, no message, no contact at all,' Remus replied sleepily.

'James, I'm really excited for the prank tonight, really I am, but I just don't want to leave today. I don't want to have to go back home,' Sirius sighed, resigning to the fact that he was not going to get any more sleep and sitting up.

'My home is Hogwarts now,' Remus smiled, sitting up as well.

'Me too,' Peter said, finally awake and alert.

James didn't really know what to say. He knew that his friend's home lives weren't great but he never imagined that they would be so bad that they wouldn't want to go back to them. Hogwarts was his home as well now, his friends were his family, but he missed his parents sometimes. He couldn't imagine a life without the feeling that no matter how bad things got he would always have his mother and father to support him and try to pick up the pieces. He didn't want to feel sorry for his friends, he knew that they didn't want that, but he couldn't help but feel a little bit guilty that his life seemed so much easier than theirs.

'Merlin, this is all getting a bit personal,' Sirius laughed, throwing the covers off his bed and standing up. 'It's prank time guys, get your lazy arses up!'

All of the details had been discussed, decided upon, finalised, changed, and then finalised again until the four friends were happy that the prank was ready. Finally satisfied, they fell onto their beds and begun packing to go home. Each of them had decided upon a different approach of doing so. James packed casually, trying to disguise that fact that he was actually quite excited to be going home so as not to upset his friends. Peter idly dropped his possessions and clothes into his trunk, not really caring what fell where, as long as the thing would close it would be fine. Remus folded all of his clothes neatly, meticulously placing them in his trunk, then changing his mind about the order of things and taking everything out to start again. Sirius, on the other hand, grabbed all of his clothes in an unfolded bundle and shoved them in his trunk as fast as he could, getting it over and done with as quickly as possible. He sat on his bed waiting for the others to finish, getting more and more bored as the minutes drew on.

'You know, we've been to some pretty cool places this year. I mean, how many people have found the kitchens, let alone in their first year,' Sirius grinned, an idea forming in his head.

'Yeah, it's been a great year,' James agreed, clambering on top of his trunk in a vain attempt to get it to close.

'I know that look, Sirius. What are you planning?' Remus laughed, recognising the mischievous glint in his friend's eye.

'Oh, just that we've never ventured into the girls dormitory...' the tall boy replied, slyly grinning at the thought.

'Oh, Sirius...' Peter sighed, laughing.

'Come on, this is boring! First to get up to the girls dorm and steal their make-up wins,' Sirius said.

'Their make-up?' James repeated, grinning.

'Planning to wear it on yourself, Sirius?' Remus laughed.

'Oh, no, not me. The loser will be wearing it.'

'Well, it's not going to be me,' Peter said, shutting over his now packed trunk. 'Ready to go?'

'You bet. Right, on three!'

'One.'

'Two.'

'...THREE!'

Four boys charged out of the room at full speed heading towards the winding staircase that they knew lead to the girls bedrooms. Sirius was in the lead, with a surprisingly quick Remus only a hairs width behind him, James jumping forward trying to grab either of their ankles and Peter bringing up the rear. At the same moment, Sirius and Remus leapt forward and opened the first door that they came to, and the red head of Lily Evans whipped around in surprise.

'Si-Rem-What are you doing here? Get out! How did you even get up here?!'

'Why wouldn't we be able to get up he-?'

Remus never got to finish his question as the stairs that they were still on suddenly began a steep incline slope. Sirius lurched forward and grabbed a mascara brush out of Mary MacDonald's hand and screamed 'I won, I won!' before tumbling down into the Common Room with his friends.

The four of them lay in a heap at the bottom of the stairs, which had by this time returned to steps, laughing and pointing at the mascara that Sirius had accidentally painted on their faces as they tried to clamber out of their heap.

'Well, hello Evans,' James smirked, looking up to see the flaming red hair of the girl in question with her piercing emerald green eyes. James felt a strange feeling deep in his chest as he looked into her face, her beautiful face.

'Don't 'hello' me, Potter,' she hissed, snatching the mascara back from Sirius and stomping back up to her dormitory shouting behind her 'You lot are nothing but a no-good bunch of marauders!' and slamming the door for good measure.

The four friends sat in silence, looking at each other and then burst out laughing.

'Nice look, Remus,' Sirius guffawed, pointing at the black line of mascara creating a large black highlight in his golden brown hair and across his forehead.

'Thanks, Sirius!' Remus grinned, flicking his fringe out of his eyes.

'You really couldn't have made it more obvious, James,' Peter giggled, accepting a hand up from the friend in question.

'Made what more obvious?'

'That you fancy Evans!'

'WHAT?! I do not! She's not – I mean, it's not as if – I'm not – It's not – URGH, SHUT UP PETE!' James stuttered, eyes widening at the accusation which he suddenly realised was true.

'Aw, how sweet. Ickle Jamesy and Evans,' Sirius cooed, earning him a punch in the side of the head by James, which exploded into a full scale play fight, tumbling about the Common Room with Peter cheering them on and Remus rolling his eyes, picking up a book and sitting in his favourite seat by the fire to read, but not bothering to rub the black make-up off his face.

'You know, I've been thinking about what Lily said to us,' James said to his friends, who were all lounging about on their beds.

'I wonder why,' Sirius whispered, winking to Peter and Remus who each grinned their reply while James threw a pillow at him.

'Seriously, I have. She called us a word; it was a pretty cool word.'

'She called you 'Potter', mate,' Peter laughed.

'No, she said it to all of us.'

'Marauders?' Remus said, propping himself up on his elbows.

'That's the one!'

'Yeah, what about it?' Sirius asked, eyebrows creased in confusion.

'It's just a good word,' James stated lazily.

'It sounds like a name of a group,' Peter said.

'Like us,' Sirius slowly added on, seeing where this was going.

'I suppose with all of the pranks you are all going to attempt, a name is needed,' Remus suggested.

'Pranks that WE will attempt, Remus, you're part of this too,' Peter grinned, winking at his friend.

'Evans will really love the fact that she named us,' James laughed.

'Well, that's that sorted then. We've got a prank tonight, and we will announce ourselves then. Remus, do you happen to know any way to do that?' Sirius asked, looking over at the smallest boy, who was the best at Charms.

'I'm sure I could come up with something by tonight,' Remus replied, smiling.

'Well, there we go. From now on, we are 'The Marauders'!' James laughed.

After the feast, the pupils of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry left the Great Hall with various different shades of red paint splattered about them as the roof had begun to apparently sag and the red paint fell from above, with 'The Marauders' spelled out in the stars of the enchanted ceiling, some of Remus's best sorcery. Everyone found it hilarious, except the Slytherins, who were absolutely disgusted at the fact they had the colour of Gryffindor all over them, and talk had immediately turned to what or whom these 'Marauders' were. At the sight of the words, Lily Evans had glared along the Gryffindor table towards the four boys who were too busy throwing paint at each other to notice or care. The swarm of pupils all headed to their dormitories to get their belongings before departing from the school, and saying goodbye to another school year. They were all caught up in a buzz of excited chatter, but the marauders headed towards the scarlet of the Hogwarts Express with much despondency. None of them wanted to leave. Sirius did not want to go home, where he would be treated like garbage, locked in his room, beaten, shunned. Remus didn't want to go back to being alone. His parents weren't even around enough to reply to any of his letters, or visit him in hospital. He had resigned himself to the fact that they didn't really care about him or what he done anymore. Peter still hadn't quite adjusted to the fact that his father would not be there when he got back. Even though he was always away anyway, it was always a comfort that he would be there if he wasn't busy, but now there's no hope. He wasn't coming back. And his mother was so damaged, so broken by what had happened to her that she had become so distant. James didn't have any problems at home, but he felt somehow guilty that his friends would be having such a terrible time and he wouldn't be able to do anything about it. He didn't want to leave them, they had become like his brothers. He couldn't stand the thought of Sirius being locked in his room, alone the whole time. It made him feel sick to imagine Remus spending the days in his house, forgetting to eat again, or, if by some miracle one of his parents bothered to turn up to see him, not even knowing or caring that he spent a week in St Mungo's. He was worried by the thought of Peter having to come to terms with his father leaving his mother on his own because his mother is so far gone she wouldn't be able to help him through it. James appreciated his home life all the more from meeting his friends, but he wished that he could make things as good for them as it was for him.

The train ride passed all together far too quickly. It seemed that they had just sat down when they had to get off at King's Cross Station. Peter began to worry. Who would be there to pick him up? He couldn't get home on his own and his mother wouldn't be able to come and get him. Remus had similar concerns. For all he knew his parents didn't even know that he was meant to be coming home today. It's not as if they had been paying much attention to his life recently. Sirius dreaded seeing his family. Surely they would wait until they got home before punishing him for the many various things they would feel like punishing him for, whether they actually happened or not? Oh, why did they have to leave Hogwarts?

Stepping off the train, the platform was almost empty. The Marauders had taken as long as they possibly could to get their trunks and get off the train. James spotted his parents waiting for him on a nearby bench and felt his stomach clench. He didn't want to leave his friends yet. Sirius looked up to see his father glowering at him from the other end of the platform, his mother looking at her son with a look of pure hate and disgust on her face. Sirius felt the sudden urge to cry but pushed it down; he would not give them the satisfaction. Peter's heart done a strange little leap when he saw his mother standing next to a wall, clutching her wand so tightly to her side it was a wonder how she hadn't snapped it, being supported by Peter's big cousin Isaac. He blinked hard to make sure he wasn't dreaming but she really was there. He couldn't help but smile. Remus couldn't see either of his parents. Instead his uncle stood leaning against the wall, staring at him. Perfect. His parents couldn't even be bothered to come and get him so they sent his uncle, who hated him with a passion, to get him instead. These holidays were going to be even worse than the last, he could feel it.

James, Sirius, Peter and Remus looked at each other for a second before whispering a 'goodbye then' and walking off to their families, Sirius and Remus smiling at how happy they knew Peter and James would be to see their parents again, James and Peter feeling sorry for Sirius and Remus, who they knew would be wishing for the walk to their relatives to never end.

With heavy hearts, but the promise of letters, the four friends left the platform one by one, looking back at one another until they had all disappeared from sight.


End file.
